


January Jot-Downs

by MashpotatoeQueen5



Series: the monthly rambles of my soul [2]
Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Batman and Robin (Comics), Young Justice (Cartoon), Young Justice - All Media Types
Genre: Abuse, Abusive Parents, Adopted Sibling Relationship, Adoption, Alfred Pennyworth Appreciation, Alfred Pennyworth Deserves a Raise, Alfred Pennyworth is So Done, Alfred Pennyworth is a Saint, Alfred Pennyworth is a Theater Nerd, Alfred Pennyworth is a Troll, Alfred Pennyworth is the Best, Aliens, Also Bruce Has and Adoption addiction, Alternate Universe - Dragons, Alternate Universe - Evil, Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Magic, Alternative Perspective, And At Asking For Help, And also very angry boi, And have an attitude, And making sure he does all the stuff he missed out on, And we are not worthy of him, Angel Wings, Angst and Humor, Animal Death, Animals, Art, Assassins & Hitmen, Attempt at Humor, Awesome Alfred Pennyworth, BAMF Alfred Pennyworth, BAMF Barbara Gordon, BAMF Cassandra Cain, BAMF Stephanie Brown, BAMF Women, Baby Helena Wayne, Babysitting, Bad Parent David Cain, Bad Parenting, Bad Parents Jack and Janet Drake, Barbara Gordon in a Wheelchair, Barbara Gordon is Oracle, Batfamily (DCU), Batfamily (DCU) Feels, Batfamily Dynamics (DCU), Batfamily Pets (DCU), Batfamily-centric (DCU), Batman Being Petty, Beautiful, Bedtime Stories, Best Friends, Bette Kane deserves more love, Bob Ross - Freeform, Bonding, Brother Feels, Brother-Sister Relationships, Brotherly Affection, Brotherly Bonding, Brotherly Love, Bruce Wayne Loves Children, Bruce Wayne is Batman, Bruce Wayne is Matches Malone, Bruce Wayne is So Done, Bruce Wayne is a Good Grandpa, Bruce Wayne is a Good Parent, Bruce Wayne is an akward bean and he's TRYING, Bruce Wayne: HOW DO I PARENT, Bruce Wayne: has twenty kids and counting, Bruce adopts a thousand kids, Bruce is a big old softee, Bruce is a dragon, Bullying, But Batfamily Style, But You Can't Take The Circus Out Of The Boy, But not from Bruce, But that's just the trauma, But they really love their Grandpa, Canon Disabled Character, Cassandra Cain Needs a Hug, Cassandra Cain is a Goddess, Cassandra Cain-centric, Cassandra was raised to kill dragons, Castles, Child Abandonment, Child Neglect, Childhood Friends, Childhood Trauma, Circus, Clouds, Colin Wilkes is Good, Comfort, Contortion, Cooking, Crossword Puzzles, Cuddling & Snuggling, Cute Kids, DAMIAN HAS FRIENDS, Damian Wayne Angst, Damian Wayne Feels, Damian Wayne Has Issues, Damian Wayne Has a Heart, Damian Wayne Needs a Hug, Damian Wayne is Bad at Feelings, Damian Wayne is Surprisingly Good With Kids, Damian Wayne is a Teenager, Damian Wayne is a smol assassin baby, Damian Wayne is the oldest, Damian expresses affection by bringing his family aliens and monsters, Damian is a bit lost with his sunshine bro, Damian is an Uncle, Dancing, Dancing and Singing, Depression, Developing Friendships, Dick Grayson Being a Little Shit, Dick Grayson Needs a Hug, Dick Grayson Tries, Dick Grayson Whump, Dick Grayson is Batman, Dick Grayson is Robin, Dick Grayson is a Ray of Sunshine, Dick Grayson is a Saint, Dick Grayson is a good dad, Dick Grayson is taking Damian's Education very seriously, Dick Please you'll traumatize the children, Dick is the sort of person to name a monster who can eat him Bruce, Disguise, Disney Movies, Doing Teenage Things, Domestic Batfamily (DCU), Dragons, Dubious Ethics, Dubious Morality, Duke Thomas Deserves Love, Duke Thomas Needs a Hug, Duke Thomas deserves the world, Duke Thomas is Signal, Duke Thomas-centric, Elves, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional/Psychological Abuse, Emotionally Constipated Batfamily, Emotionally Repressed Batfamily (DCU), Epic Friendship, Escape, Even as Matches Malone, Everything is Beautiful and Nothing Hurts, Fae & Fairies, Fae Magic, Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tale Endings, Fairy Tale Logic, Families of Choice, Family, Family Bonding, Family Dinners, Family Dynamics, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Fantasy, Feelings Realization, Feminist Themes, Financial Issues, Fluff, Fluff and Humor, Food, Forehead Kisses, Found Family, Friendship, Friendship to the Max, Fun, Gen, Giants, Good Friend Roy Harper, Good Grandparent Alfred Pennyworth, Good Parent Talia al Ghul, Gotham Girl - Freeform, Grief/Mourning, Grievers, Grocery Shopping, Grocery Store, Haly's Circus, Harm to Animals, He can't stop himself, He's better now, Healing, Hijinks & Shenanigans, Hiking, Hostage Situations, Hot Chocolate, House Cleaning, Hugs, Humming, Humor, Hurt Cassandra Cain, Hurt No Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, I Wrote This Instead of Sleeping, I will not be taking criticism at this time, IDENTITY SHENANIGANS, Idiots in Love, Imagination, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, Independence, Introspection, Isolation, It Gets Worse Before It Gets Better, Jason Todd Has a Heart, Jason Todd Likes Knives, Jason Todd is Soft, Jason is a Dork, Joker Venom (DCU), Joker is a Monster, Kent farm, Kidnapping, Late Night Conversations, Let The BatFamily Grow Up And Be Happy 2020, Lian Harper Is a Sweetheart, Libraries, Like Babysitting little siblings, Loopholes, Love, Ma Kent's Pies Are the BEST pies, Magic, Magic-Users, Magical Creatures, Male-Female Friendship, Maps, Mar'i Grayson is a Sweetheart, Mario Kart, Martial Arts, Mercenaries, Minor Character Death, Minor Tim Drake/Kon-El | Conner Kent, Mistaken Identity, Mountains, Movie Night, Moving On, Murder, Murder Family, Murderers, Musical References, Musicals, Mute Cassandra Cain, Near Death Experiences, Nightmares, Not Really Character Death, Nymphs & Dryads, Older Sibling Damian Wayne, On the Run, One Big Happy Family, Orphanage, Overprotective, Painting, Parkour, Past Character Death, Past Child Abuse, Past Drug Addiction, Past Rape/Non-con, People Change People, Pets, Photographs, Pictures, Platonic Cuddling, Platonic Love, Platonic Relationships, Please protect these children, Police Officer Dick Grayson, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Press and Tabloids, Protective Batfamily (DCU), Protective Damian Wayne, Protectiveness, Psychological Trauma, Reading, Reading Aloud, Recovery, Riding in The Cart, Role Reversal, Roy Harper & Jason Todd Bromance, Roy Harper is a DAD, Roy Harper is a Good Bro, Run by a dragon, Sassy, Sassy Alfred Pennyworth, Scars, School, Self-Esteem Issues, Sentimental, Shadowbending & Shadowbenders, Shapeshifting, Sibling Love, Sibling Rivalry, Siblings, Silly, Singing, Single Parents, Sister-Sister Relationship, Sisters, Sketches, Sleeping Beauty Elements, Smol Damian Wayne, Snark, Some Humor, Someone Hug Tim, Sort Of, Sparring, Stars, Step-siblings, Stephanie Brown & Dick Grayson Friendship, Stephanie Brown Appreciation, Stephanie Brown Needs a Hug, Stephanie Brown Tries, Stephanie Brown is Spoiler, Stephanie Brown is Strong, Stephanie Brown is a Good Bro, Stephanie Brown is a Gremlin, Stephanie Brown is a Little Shit, Stephanie Brown is a Troll, Stephanie Brown is a gift unto this realm, Street Rats, Strength, Stressed Dick Grayson, Superman is a Big Blue Boyscout, Superpowers, Survival, Talia al Ghul Tries, Telepathy, That are carnivores, The Wayne Family Needs A Hug, The Waynes have a kidnapping board, There is a universe in your chest and you are infinite among the stars, They'll figure it out, Tim Drake Angst, Tim Drake Has Abandonment Issues, Tim Drake Has Mental Health Issues, Tim Drake Has a Bad Time, Tim Drake Needs Help, Tim Drake Needs a Hug, Tim Drake is Joker Jr., Tim Drake is Sleep Deprived, Tim Drake is a cuddle monster, Timkon, Tired Alfred Pennyworth, Toddlers, Tooth-Rotting Fluff, Touring, Trauma, True Love's Kiss, Undercover, Undercover Missions, Unicorns, Vanity, WAS joker junior, Wally West is a Good Bro, We are more than who we were yesterday, Who just so happens to be a dragon, Wings, Wizards, Women Being Awesome, Worldbuilding, Worried Alfred Pennyworth, Worry, Wrestling, You Can Take The Boy Out Of The Circus, Zoo, and i love her, beauty is a social construct, because PROMPTS, but like, but super vague, in a house, it escalates, justice league - Freeform, mostly - Freeform, or at least getting there, people change, perseverance, stories, strange illnesses
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-02
Updated: 2020-01-31
Packaged: 2021-02-27 04:13:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 31
Words: 74,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22080880
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MashpotatoeQueen5/pseuds/MashpotatoeQueen5
Summary: A collection of oneshots centered around the Batfam.1  Duke gets a tour of the Manor2  Depressed Tim3  Dick & Bruce have a dance party4  Stephanie pretends to be Bruce for the JL5  Damian's being bullied - Duke notices6  Harper & Cass (Sister Bonding!)7  Touch-starved Tim8  Dick is too flexible for his own good9  Stephanie helps Tim recover from Joker Jr.10 Jason babysits Lian - Roy copes11 Bruce is a dragon - he hoards small children (Cass Edition!)12 Damian & Dick shop13 Fantasy Setting AU14 Damian has friends15 Bette and Barbara meet16 Dick grieves- Stephanie helps17 TimKon- Sleeping Beauty AU (but *superheroes*)18 Bruce & Damian Bonding19 Duke figures out his new family20 Damian defends Stephanie21 Claire Clover (Gotham Girl)22 Tim's depressed, Jason cares - Cue Road Trip23 The Manor's decent to Zoodom24 Damian babysits Mar'i & Helena25 Villain AU26 Telepathic Tim27 Talia Redemption Arc28 Reverse Batfam AU29 The Malone Family30 Everyone Loves Alfred31 Bruce realizing he loves his family
Series: the monthly rambles of my soul [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1589455
Comments: 784
Kudos: 1753





	1. in the name of being brave (though it's just another word for being afraid)

**Author's Note:**

> 1/1/2020
> 
> Chapter Title From Bad Blood, by Sleeping At Last
> 
> Warnings for sad backstories.

The tour starts like this:

Tim stands in the entryway, bags under his eyes deeper and darker than any low hanging moon, and waves his hands around the grand high vaulted ceilings.

“Hi,” Tim says, sounding exhausted, smiling a crooked exhausted grin, moving completely without energy. This boy’s entire _being_ is just so utterly, utterly tired to the point Duke sort of wants to wrap him in bubble wrap and just make him _go to bed._ “Welcome to Wayne Manor. Yes, most of the stuff here is actually incredibly valuable in monetary worth. No, Bruce will not get mad at you if you break it. However, if you break something expensive, like a priceless Ming Dynasty vase for example, by doing something stupid like, say, testing if you can beat the world record of most cartwheels done in a row in under thirty seconds, then Alfred will give you dissapointed eyes. Yes, this is worse than a Bruce lecture.”

Duke blinks, thinks _how the hell are disappointed eyes worse than a lecture from Batman-_

A voice from above cuts off his thoughts.

“Hey! You break a priceless Ming Dynasty vase _one time_ and then people hold it over your head for the rest of your life. Also, I _beat_ that record, so take _that-”_

Duke looks up. And _up._

There is a man sitting in the chandelier. He has a book in one hand- Percy Jackson, from the looks of it- and a box of obnoxiously sugary cereal in the other. He is also pouting petulantly and somehow making the look work despite obviously being at _least_ twenty years old.

Duke looks at Dick. Duke looks at Tim. Tim does not seem concerned or at all put off by the fact that there is a grown human being hanging out in the chandelier. 

So he breathes, breathes. The manor is a weird place, but he’s sure he’s handled weirder.

But of course, that’s only the start of it. It only gets weirder from there.

_(His mother had told him to be brave, once, had cupped his cheek in her calloused palm. Her eyes were filled with a warrior’s light, and she had been strong, and smart, and brilliant-)_

_(But Duke tries not to think about that.)_

They tumble through a hallway of booby traps. Duke follows very closely behind Tim, who treats the entire thing like it is completely normal. 

“Damian gets paranoid, sometimes,” he says, calmly ducking down as a spruced up spray gun shoots out bursting jets of something acidic and burning. “Bruce _hates_ it, because it usually means having to call in a repair man and making up a bunch of lame excuses, but no one’s figured out how to get him to stop.” 

Duke thinks he sees a hanging wall of spikes around the left corner. He’s superbly pleased when they turn to the right.

Which is when, of course, they find the boy in question.

Damian is having some sort of stare down with Stephanie. The pair of them are leaning into each other over an office desk, every muscle of their bodies tensed and frozen. Tim enters and sits down on the couch, drinks coffee and watches them.

Duke, slowly, cautiously, follows after him. 

And they watch. One minute passes. Then two. And then _three._ The entire time, neither of them blinks. Water has long since welled up in their eyes and started dripping down their faces. It is completely silent in the room, and somewhere, distantly, he can hear a clock tick.

And then, and _then-_

Tim brings his thermos to his mouth and _slurps._

It is the loudest and longest and most _absurd_ slurp in human history. Duke tears his eyes away to stare at the older boy, who simply smirks, continues slurping, and watches Damian.

And the pint sized assassin- twitches. Jerks minutely towards the couch.

_Sluuuuuuuuurrrrpppp~_

Damian’s eyes flicker towards Tim, incredulous, _furious_ , and-

And Stephanie positively _crows_ with success. 

“Hah! HA! I won! I won fair and square and now you’ve gotta-”

“You did _not_ win fair and square, Drake assisted to, you are both dirty cheaters and rotten liars and I declare the whole thing expunged due to unfair practices. I _demand-_

“Did we ever say slurping was against the rules? Huh? Huh? Where did we say that? Tell me, tell me, tell me- we never put anything in the contract about it and _so-”_

 _“I demand_ a rematch, and Drake must leave the room and-”

“Hey, that’s not fair, Steph won fair and square and you were the one who made the deal and so-”

“ _The deal was made under false circumstances and thus is eradicated you absolute_ imbecile-”

Duke watches the three way argument explode in front of him, Damian defensive and prickly, Stephanie displaying her best shit-eating grin, and Tim smirking the entire time. He can hardly hear what anyone is saying they’re all yelling so loud, and he watches the whole thing like a supersonic ping pong match.

By the end of it, Damian looks sullen, Stephanie looks triumphant, and Tim is _still_ smirking. Duke is terribly confused, but as the youngest member of their little party storms out of the room, muttering what concerningly sounds like death threats, Stephanie calls out, “I look forward to my waffles tomorrow!”

As the pair of them leave Stephanie to her devices in order to continue the tour, Tim pats him on the shoulder. 

“That’s the seventh time Damian’s lost a best to her. He keeps swearing off them and then getting pulled back in because he’s got an ego the size of a small country and it is so, _so_ easy to bait him into it. Stephanie’s been getting breakfast in bed for all week.”

Tim’s grin is absolutely evil in its joy. 

Duke nods, slowly, and his smile is nothing but polite confusion.

_(“Let’s take this one second at a time,” his father had said, working through a math problem. And Duke had been frustrated and tired, had been ready to call it a day, to give up, and yet-)_

_(And yet his dad’s big warm eyes had looked at him so steadily, so sure, and how could he give up in the face of that steadfast belief? What could he do but try?)_

_(So Duke picked up the pencil. He breathed. He made it work.)_

Duke is so lost.

He’s been in the manor for a little over half an hour now, and it’s ridiculous, really, because no living quarters should be _this big_ and yet-

And yet here they are, standing in the entryway of _another_ small sitting quarters, and Tim is _still_ talking about the layout.

Not that Duke is paying much attention. Duke is too busy staring slightly slack jawed at the seemingly normal scuffle that has broken out.

If you can call the deadly high-speed dance tearing apart the room something so simple as a ‘scuffle.’

Cass is absolutely silent and lethal, jumping to and from furniture like a cat, eyes slitted in focused attention. Jason is a glaring opposite, so packed with muscle he is almost larger than life. And is that a-?

Yes. Yes it is. Jason is also swinging around a rather large dueling knife, smirking, seemingly enjoying himself.

 _Oh no,_ Duke thinks, _I’m in a house full of lunatics. I’m in too deep. They’re insane. The entire lot of them. Completely, utterly insane._

Cass backflips over Jason, lands neatly in front of him, not a hair out of place. She smiles, unconcerned for the knife-wielding man behind her, and then pulls him into a hug. Duke lets it happen and watches with wide eyes as Jason peers at him calculatively from the corner.

They told Duke that this man died, once. That he came back to life. 

Something in Jason’s eyes makes that little factoid very hard to forget.

Duke _blinks,_ and suddenly Cass is dropping to the floor and the knife is swinging at him, _swinging_ at him, missing his nose by a few scant centimeters.

Jason sighs, lowering the weapon.

“Dammit, Cass-”

And Cassandra only laughs in response, a silent, graceless thing that shakes her entire body with her good humour. 

Duke might have joined her some other day, but at that particular moment he is far too busy being grateful he still has a nose.

Tim does not pay attention to any of this. Tim is busy finishing a text on his phone. In his other hand he has the utterly massive thermos he’s been carrying around the entire tour. It’s almost the size of his head. No one gives it a second glance.

It is also empty. 

Which, of course, means that Tim looks at it with a despair more worthy of losing a favoured pet, and then says, steely, “Okay, we’re going to need to make a quick pit stop in the kitchen. I need more coffee if we’re both going to make it out of this alive.”

Is that sarcasm? He can’t tell. _Duke can’t tell._ Tim’s deadpan is a thing of beauty and it’s terrifying him in all the ways a joke really, really shouldn’t. 

_Completely insane, the whole lot of them..._

_(His mother told him to be brave. His father told him to take things by moments.)_

_(There’s this shaking thing in his chest. It is shattered and aching and carving up his throat. He’s trying, but he does not feel very brave, here. He hasn’t felt brave in a very long time.)_

_(He feels lost. And scared. And lonely.)_

_(There are people in this manor, and they feel somehow greater than human. They move through these creaking hallways as if it is as easy as breathing. They flit from shadow to shadow, and the dark welcomes them.)_

_(And despite all this space, Duke can’t help but wonder if there’s any room left.)_

"This," says Tim, making a beeline to the coffee maker "is the kitchen."

Duke nods, because the kitchen is something he can handle, because the kitchen is Alfred's domain and surely this part of the manor, at least, will be sane with the old man's influence.

Or, at least, that's what Duke thinks until Tim opens his mouth.

"There are no nerve strikes allowed in the kitchen. Nor any bladed weapons or bombs larger than the size of your fist. Guns are permitted if sheathed, and avoid blunting cutlery at all costs.”

Tim sounds far too matter of fact. Duke is still trying to get over the fact that small bombs are permissible in the kitchen.

But before he can process properly, they’re on their way again, Tim describing the layout of the bottom floors of the manor, entire coffee pot in hand.

Three hours later, Bruce finds him tucked away in the library. 

And Duke’s not panicking. He’s _not._ He’s just… a little overwhelmed.

“You okay, chum?”

“Yeah?”

The word slips out of Duke’s throat high pitched and breathless, sounding far too much like a question.

He breathes, tries again. Louder this time. Braver, though he doesn’t feel very brave.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m fine. Perfectly fine. Why wouldn’t I be?”

Bruce hums, settles himself down on the patch of carpet besides him, looks up at the ceiling. There’s some sort of purposeful technique, in that, Duke is all too aware. He’s used it himself with terrified little kids lost in alleyways and warehouses once or twice: making himself small, giving them the time they need to collect themselves…

Duke _knows…_ But at the same time, he’s so relieved that he’s not being held under that piercing stare he can’t even make himself bring it up.

And it works.

“I suppose,” Bruce says, calm and warm, more than a little awkward, “Though it wouldn’t be the first time the welcoming tour sparked some anxiety. I can’t think of anyone who wasn’t put off by it all, at first.”

Duke looks at his knees. The jeans have worn thin, jagged holes showing the dark skin underneath. They’re cheap, these jeans, bought second hand. They look dirty compared to the pristine leather bound books, to Bruce’s own sharp khakis. 

“Yeah,” he says, and this time he doesn’t try to make it loud, “yeah, it was a little overwhelming.”

Bruce hums again. Soft. Quiet and open. Noncommittal. There’s a question there, tugging at the corners of his eyes, an offer. If Duke wants to tell him more, the stage is his for the taking.

And Duke breathes, and he takes it.

“It’s just- It’s just, this is a house full of superheroes, right? And I’m not- I can’t- I’m _not_ a superhero. I can’t balance on chandeliers or roll away from knives without looking. I’m not people-smart like Stephanie or practical like Tim. I’m not good at knife work or having perfect self control or-”

And suddenly Bruce is in front of him. His hands are on Duke’s shoulders and they’re a heavy, comforting weight. They remind him of his dad’s, and that makes his throat close up, because that’s the thing, isn’t it? Duke doesn’t get to have him anymore. He doesn’t get his dad or his mom or his home, which was small and known and comforting and now is completely and utterly _gone._

He gets this, now, this massive manor that creaks and winds and echoes with stories he’s never been a part of. He gets this manor and all the people in it, these crazy wonderful people who sneak out in the dead of the night with a cry of justice in their veins, and vengeance. He gets this man, this _man,_ who built himself from the ground up, who has so many fantastic kids and how is Duke supposed to live up to that? How is he supposed to not slip into all the cracks and shatter into nothing. _How is he supposed to-_

“Hey,” Bruce says, too soft and too kind and far too understanding.

Duke remembers that the man lost his parents. He wants to ask if this aching shattered thing in his chest will ever heal, if the grief ever ends.

He doesn’t.

“Hey,” Bruce says, and he’s awkward still. Duke is beginning to believe that that is just his natural state of being. “You don’t have to be anybody but yourself. Take your time, kiddo, we’ll make it work.”

The man sounds determined, sure, and his eyes are very blue. 

But there’s an iron will hiding in that tone. A sheer sort of determination that has faced greater threats than this. A steadfast belief, a certain kind of warmth.

And Duke nods, nods, because how could he give up in the face of that steadfast belief? What could he do but try?

“It’s lunchtime. You ready to head back into the madhouse?”

He breathes around his shattered parts. He lives. He moves on, one second at a time.

“Yeah,” he says, and it tastes a little like bravery on his tongue.


	2. i can feel the darkness coming (and i'm afraid of myself)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/2/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Help, By Hurts*
> 
> This was... prompted. At the tail end of March Madness. But for the life of me I CAN'T FIND THE PROMPT. But basically it asked for Tim with depression.
> 
> Warnings for Depression and Depressive Thoughts, and not properly taking care of yourself.

“You doing okay there, Tim?”

Tim smiles. It pulls at his cheeks and feels unnatural on his face. It’s too small, and he feels scrutinized even though he knows no one is going to notice.

Or maybe they do. Maybe they’re just so used to these small-half there flickers of upturned lips that they don’t even care about the fact that few of them are ever real anymore.

For a family of detectives, they’re not very good at recognizing what’s going right under their noses, at realizing Tim’s been quieter than usual, slower, every action out of place, even though Tim is purposely not trying really hard to cover anything up. 

He doesn’t have the energy to really try, anyways.

“Fine, Dick. Just tired.”

And he is, he  _ is.  _ Tim’s been saying that a lot lately, has been  _ feeling  _ that a lot lately.

_ Food is unappetizing and I’m tired. _

_ Taking a shower isn’t worth it and I’m tired. _

_ Training is too much effort and I’m tired. _

_ Social interaction is too taxing and I’m tired. _

He keeps waiting for the sensation to go away and it keeps  _ not. _ And all that is left is Tim going through the motions, feeling slow and heavy and not fully there, feeling like the slightest breeze might knock him over, feeling like his feet are planted in cement and he can’t move, can’t get anywhere, like he’s just  _ stuck. _

And he keeps thinking, keeps thinking-

_ Existence is exhausting and I’m so, so tired.  _

It makes him angry, almost, that he’s right there and screaming into the void and not a single one of them can bother themselves to listen enough in order to hear. He wants someone to ask, to come close, to hold him tight, to tell him it’s all going to be okay even if they both know that it’s not, that it won’t be, that it won’t ever be.

Which is not fair, not on them, not on  _ him.  _ It’s not fair and it’s self deprecating and if he wants help he should just ask for it, use his words, he’s a big boy now and he shouldn’t have to cry to get attention, not when he can just  _ talk- _

But it doesn’t stop that small bead of resentment in his chest. It doesn’t stop the aching loneliness even when he’s in the same room with a dozen other people. It doesn’t stop that bone deep exhaustion following him everywhere he goes. It doesn’t stop the numbness.

The problem is that he’s got too many graves to visit. The problem is that his throat is all cut up by the names lodged deep down in there, sharp and cruel and unsaid becuase those people aren’t  _ here  _ anymore and-

And Tim breathes. His lungs inflate and deflate. Hollow, living things.

One interesting truth that he has come to know is that people don’t mourn bodies. They mourn memories, and stories, and could-have-been’s. They mourn all the little facets of a person that leaves an impact on  _ them,  _ but there are no regards for the decaying flesh under freshly tilled soil. 

People mourn all the things that the dead could have meant to them, given time. They mourn all the things that they know the dead could have meant to the world, given a chance. They mourn for themselves, for those left behind.

Grief is such a selfish, human thing. And Tim curls up in his room some mornings and weeps selfish tears and rages selfish arguments against people who aren’t there.

(Another truth: gods may walk around the earth, but when they crumple they hit the ground just as fragile as any human. They still bleed.)

Hollow lungs. Hollow hearts. He’s hollowing himself from the inside out.

He lets it happen. 

There is this gaping emptiness inside of him and it takes and it takes and it takes. It is not fair, it is not right and it hurts, glass shards in his throat and knives in his chest. He wants to call it grief but he’s tasted grief, he knows how it feels, how you carry it in the palm of your hands and keep it in your pocket, how it lingers like a storm cloud and carries you away.

Tim  _ knows  _ grief. 

The human body is approximately fifteen percent bone, eight percent blood, forty percent muscle, twenty-five percent organs, and twelve percent fat. It is not empty. It is a living breathing thing with thousands upon thousands of tiny little mechanisms curled up upon one another, making things work, making things  _ happen- _

The human body is not hollow and yet Tim is hollowing himself out, hollowing himself out bit by bit by bit...

And he should say something. He should-  _ say something.  _ Bruce is two feet away from him, lecturing, worried, exasperated. He’s angry, but only because he’s scared, and “ _ what were you even thinking, Tim? What you did was reckless and stupid, you could have gotten shot-” _

The truth is, Tim wasn’t thinking. He was tired. He probably shouldn’t be out in the field. But-

But he’s already had his mantle as a hero taken away from him once, twice. He can’t let it happen again. He  _ won’t  _ let it happen again.  _ He- _

He’s too tired for this. He’s too tired for Bruce’s lecture, too tired for an argument, too tired, too tired, too tired-

Tim is breathing hollowed air. It hollows him out, bit by bit by bit.

He’s deteriorating, he’s falling apart at the seams. Alfred is worried, keeps trying to serve him extra portions. Bruce is worried, and he keeps lecturing and checking for fever. Dick is worried, keeps inviting him over for movies and sleep overs. Stephanie’s worried, keeps texting him at inane hours of the day. Jason is worried, Cass is worried, everyone is so very worried and Tim should be better than this. Tim shouldn’t be burden just by existing, and yet-

He didn’t get out of bed yesterday. He didn’t eat anything on Thursday. He has a hundred and thirty seven unread emails to go through. He hasn’t turned in his report from patrol last night, hasn’t even started it. He needs to sleep, needs to eat, needs to take care of this living breathing body that cannot function on nothing.

But he’s hollowed out, you see. Nothing is all he has.

It’s like a checklist. A checklist of all the things he just can't  _ do  _ anymore, because he’s so very tired and he’s running a body tearing itself apart over all its empty space. 

Jason is the one who finds him in the end.

Tim needed to get something from storage at the back of the cave. He needed to grab it for a report that was already two days late. A simple task. A basic one.

But he gets to the back of the cave and he starts organizing his way through the piles of evidence and trophies and supplies and-

And he’s very tired. He’s breathing hollow air.

So he just- sits down. Sits down right there on the cold cave floor. And he doesn’t stand back up.

He’s not sure how much time passes. Two hours. Three. It’s very cold and then it’s not cold at all, and that should be concerning but Tim finds he doesn’t really care.

Which is, of course, when Jason finds him, swears up a storm, and hauls him to his feet. He’s wrapped in the older man’s jacket in seconds. A brisk medical checkup follows immediately after.

“Have you been drugged?”

Tim shakes his head. Jason’s eyes are a very sharp blue, burning and brilliant and angry. 

“Concussion? Twisted anything? Gassed?”

Tim shakes his head, shakes his head.

“Then why the  _ hell  _ were you out here, huh? Jesus christ, Tim, your lips are nearly purple!”

Time breathes hollow air.

“I’m just tired.”

Even to his own ears, his words sound very faint.

“Like  _ hell  _ you are,” Jason hisses, pulls Tim close into a rough hug and starting up brisk circular motions around and around his back, trying to warm him up, trying to make things better. He can feel Jason’s hand pressing against his spine, senses the way Jason’s frown deepens. “This isn’t okay, Tim.  _ You’re  _ not okay.”

Tim closes his eyes. He wants to deny it, he wants to agree. Mostly, he just wants to cry.

But he’s too tired, so he doesn’t do anything at all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Take care of yourself lovelies. You are not alone.


	3. i'm walking on sunshine (and don't it feel good!)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/3/2020
> 
> *Title Chapter from Walking On Sunshine by Katrina and the Waves*
> 
> No warnings, except if you count massive amounts of cavity-inducing fluff. :)
> 
> (Also, will start responding to prompts tomorrow!)

“HALT!”

Bruce, immediately freezes all over. Eyes alert, shoulders tense, feet slightly separated and braced for an attack. He searches for the danger, for the threat, calculates what would be the best way to deal with any intruders in the cramped hallway. But when he looks… when he looks….

There’s nothing. 

Nothing, except for his tiny rugrat kid grinning his thousand kilowatt grin, dressed in oversized socks and a shirt that goes down to his knees, covering his shorts.

To complete the look, it appears Dick has taken one of Bruce’s suit jackets and tied it around his neck in the intimidation of a cape. One of Bruce’s very,  _ very  _ expensive suit jackets.

….They’re going to have to have another talk about raiding the closets and using it for dress up. This is the fifth time this has happened so far. This  _ week.  _

He thinks he should maybe be a little concerned about how thoroughly his kid has him wrapped around his little finger, because one word from him and suddenly Bruce is tensed and ready for battle, but-

But Dick’s just beaming so  _ brightly  _ at him, bouncing on his toes, shimmying a little with every second. His hair keeps flopping in his eyes. His eyes are practically _ shining  _ and-

Well.

Bruce finds himself relaxing, feels a small smile of his own filter across his face.

“What am I stopping for?”

Dick’s grin, if possible, somehow gets even brighter.

“ _ This,”  _ he declares dramatically, waving to the center hallway he’s clumsily taped off, “is a  _ dance only _ zone. So, if you step in, around, or over this space, you have to dance with me.”

Bruce surveys the scene. The tape cuts off right at the walls on all four corners, and both passageways to the rest of the manor are on the other side. With a running leap, he could easily jump over the sequestered space, but Dick accounted for that with the ‘over’ thing. He supposes he could also turn back the way he came and come around a different way, but….

Dick is looking at him. Expectantly. 

Those blue eyes are going to be the death of him.

So he asks, “Why do I have to dance?”

His kid snorts. 

“Because that’s the  _ rules.” _

“Why?”

“Because  _ reasons,  _ Bruce,  _ reasons.” _

And then before Bruce can do anything about it, Dick’s hand snaps out and grabs his owns, giving an all mighty heave and shoving him into the square.

Bruce blinks. Dick grins excitedly, practically vibrating.

“You’re in the dance zone, you’re in the dance zone,  _ yooooou’re  _ in the  _ daaaaance zooneee.” _

Blinking again, he looks down at the small boy by his feet.

“Was that supposed to be singing?”

“B! C’mon, you’re in the dance zone! So you  _ have to dance!” _

And with that, the kid whips out a radio from… somewhere (Bruce probably doesn’t want to know), turns it on, and starts doing the most spastic jig to have ever been. Hands flying everywhere, legs kicking out, jumping and bobbing and leaping back and forth in imperfect circles around Bruce’s larger frame.

There’s laughter bubbling up in his throat. There’s something warm in his chest.

Two small calloused hands grab his own larger, scarred ones. Starts moving them back and forth and up and down, wiggling them this way and that. 

Dick’s voice, bright, sing song.

“You’re supposed to be  _ daaaanciiing!” _

The radio is blasting something he’s never heard. If Alfred walks in on them doing this, he’ll hold it over his head for literal years. He doesn’t know what to do with his feet.

But Dick is waiting. Expectantly.

And Bruce… dances. 

A little off kilter. A little slow and stiff compared to Dick’s wild frolicing steps. This is nothing like taking some young rich socialite out for a waltz.

It is  _ infinitely  _ more fun. 

The chorus is coming on, now, louder and more upbeat, and Bruce can feel that warmth expanding in his chest, ballooning with a sort of soft and brilliant pressure. He takes his kid’s hand, gives him a spin.

Dick’s exuberance is instantaneous. 

“Holy  _ bunions-  _ Bruce. Bruce do that again and whatever you do  _ don’t stop.” _

So Bruce takes his hand. And spins him again.

And again. And  _ again.  _ Five times, ten times,  _ twenty  _ times. Dick expertly flips his grip with every turn to continue each smooth rotation, nothing more than a human spinning top, laughing like mad.

The tempo of the music picks up. Bruce spins him faster. He doesn’t understand how the kid isn’t crazy dizzy yet. 

The song finally ends, and Dick’s  _ still  _ laughing, taking a couple unsteady steps before seemingly recovering  _ (How?  _ Bruce thinks,  _ How?).  _

Then suddenly his kid freezes, still looking up at him, a shit-eating grin slowly crawling up his face.

“Bruce,” he says, “ _ Bruce.  _ I have thought of an even  _ better  _ idea.”

Bruce quirks an eyebrow. Dick rubs his hands together.

Which is how, two minutes later, Bruce finds himself spinning in tight circles, a whooping nine year old clutched to his chest, trying not to get too terribly dizzy while Dick screams, “Faster, faster,  _ spin faster-” _

He realizes, at some point, that he’s started laughing. 

Finally, Bruce becomes too wobbly to continue on. He stumbles awkwardly and then leans against the wall, panting a little bit and smiling far too softly at the kid giggling in his arms. 

“You’re a dork, dork.”

Dick’s hair looks windswept, eyes watery with laughter and cheeks flushed with exertion.

“ _ You’re  _ the dork.  _ I’m  _ a scallywag.”

“Hmmm, really?”

“Yup. _ Alfred _ said so.”

“Ah, well if  _ he  _ said so, I guess it  _ must  _ be true.”

“Uh huh.”

The radio is still playing. Something about sunshine and feeling the love.

Two small hands cup his cheeks, and Bruce refocuses to find Dick’s blue eyes fixated intently on his own. 

“I,” he says, “am going to run away now. If you don’t catch me in time, I can and will eat all of the cookies Alfred made yesterday that he thinks I don’t know about.”

He smacks a kiss on Bruce’s forehead, worms himself out of his hold, and tears down the hall. 

The older man blinks, blinks. It’s been a long while since he’s felt this soft and warm.

Then he takes off down the hall after Dick, because Alfred  _ will  _ kill him if the kid spoils his dinner by eating too many cookies. Again.


	4. i don't care if (the world knows what my secrets are)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/4/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Secrets, By Mary Lambert*
> 
> Prompt: Stephanie filling in for Bats at a JL meeting. (The+Sneak)
> 
> WARNINGS : None
> 
> ART BY THE INCREDIBLE CrazyRubsOff --> Thank you again so much you wonderful bean!! <3  
> Enjoy! :)

Stephanie clears her throat, standing up at the front of the Justice League Conference Room. She’s got a voice modular, a metric ton of padding, a ridiculously tall set of platforms, and a face mask designed to create an illusion of a much larger and masculine face.

Most importantly, she’s got a cold, and several dozen cameras hooked up in every nook and cranny of the room.

She’s _ready._

And Bruce is one petty, petty man.

She can see the interaction now:

 _Don’t come with us to this strange alien planet with sub zero temperatures and a lot of unknown germs,_ the JL had told Batman. _Don’t come with us and get yourself sick and infect your entire family with alien disease._

And Batman would have grunted, been all _I’m Batman. I don’t get sick. Justice. Night. Assorted Grunts._

Which, well, didn’t turn out.

The Wayne Manor was on lockdown, quarantined from the rest of the world while the rest of the family put up with bright neon purple splotches and random muscle stiffness that left them paralysed for several minutes at a time. 

Stephanie is only safe because _she_ had been irresponsible here on _Earth_ two days before the crisis and thus had been hiding up in her room, riding out a cold, and thus nowhere near the manor. 

(So yeah. Take _that,_ Bruce.)

And now she’s here, impersonating Batman at a JL meeting, because the old man didn't want to put up with his colleagues rubbing their noses all up in his business and saying _I told you so~_

Which, fair. But for the record, the only reason Stephanie agreed is because the entire situation was too hilarious to ignore. 

The rest of the poor, paralyzed purple-spotted fam are watching the livestream Tim has set up. She’s ninety-eight percent sure that a betting pool has started. In fact, she’s sort of disappointed that she can’t take part of the thing herself-

But wait, wait, _Focus-_

The JL starts streaming in. Stephanie remains standing stiff and stern, trying to replicate Bruce’s squinty eyes of _you all are idiots and are thirty three seconds late how dare you._ By the way Hal Jordan looks guiltily away and Barry Allen plops into his seat in record time, she thinks she succeeds.

Good. Wonder Woman walks in. Stephanie lessens the scowl. Nods the tiniest fraction of an inch. The only person Bruce will show any sort of signs of respect to because he’d have to be even more of a buffoon than he already is to not express it. Besides, she’s pretty sure Jason, Tim, _and_ Dick would hold an actual mutiny if he didn’t.

Superman walks in, and this one’s a _hard_ one. Because she has to scowl. She has to scowl big and mean and put all the _don’t come near me you’re contagious you big blue boy scout_ that she can, but do it in a way that _Clark_ will read as _awwww friendship._ This is the one member of the Justice League that Bruce actually actively _likes,_ and thus obviously that entire vulnerability has to be completely hidden from everything and anything.

Actually, the more she stands her and tries to replicate Bruce’s thoughts and feelings, the more she wonders how on earth the man is still functioning.

Oh well.

The rest of the JL crowds in without much of a hubbub, though there is a minor freak out moment when Martian Manhunter walks in and Stephanie holds her breath. Bruce doesn’t like his thoughts read, so hopefully the martian won’t-

The alien sits down without even a second glance. Stephanie mentally sighs in relief. 

She delivers Batman’s speal of damages and repairs, boring political politics that they should be aware of, and the assorted villains everyone needs to keep a lookout for. She keeps her voice even and stiff, her posture completely straight, and her face in utter deadpan the entire time.

Everyone listens to her. No one looks suspicious. Bruce is going to lecture them for _hours_ when he gets back about stolen identities and double checking. He’s probably running drills in his brain right now.

Finally, the meeting ends. 

Everyone stands up and starts murmuring and chatting to one another, like a bunch of highschoolers freshly relieved from class. Stephanie stands at the front, watching and silent, partly because it’s a Bruce thing to do and partly because this improvised suit is _heavy_ and she’s not completely sure that she can move.

But then Clark pops up with no less than fifteen pies.

“I’ve brought pie!” he says, stating the obvious. 

Batman would think of that as stating the obvious, wouldn’t he? And he’d also be against pie in general in the meeting room, despite the fact that she _knows_ he smuggles Alfred’s cookies and eats them at the Batcomputer. Stephanie sends a mild disapproving glare towards the boy scout, just in case. Worse comes to worst the man will just assume it’s simply another random glare randomly sent his way, as Batman is prone to do.

Not that it matters. There is fresh, homemade pie just a few steps away. She can make it that far. She _will_ make it that far, for pie and all that is good and true in this world. Just you wait-

Boom. Three steps. _Boom._

She grabs an entire apple pie, because _yes,_ and turns around to find Clark floating right behind her. She does not flinch, because she’s _Batman_ and Bruce would never, but also because flinching would involve moving all the heavy padding and _no thank you._

They look at eachother, Clark grinning, Stephanie deadpan. 

“What are you doing with that pie there, Batman?”

Stephanie grunts, to gather time. _Think of an excuse,_ she thinks _think of an excuse that isn't ‘I want to take this entire pie back to my dorm room and consume it for dinner in one sitting in order to regain all the calories I lost hauling this freaking_ heavy _costume around all morning.’ Think!_

“I have twenty children,” she mutters, heading towards subtle sarcasm but also an _obviously_ tone.

Clark beams, nods, opens his mouth to say something. But the padding and kevlar really _are_ ridiculously heavy and she needs a way out before she bursts into hysterical laughter. What can she do?

She looks at Clark. Happy, boy scout, Clark, with a heart of gold. 

She thinks, _Oh._

_OH._

Is it evil? Yes.

But will it get her out of here? _Yes._

She grunts, again, draws the attention back to herself. Places one heavy hand onto Superman’s shoulder- _it should not be that difficult to lift a singular arm-_ and offers the smallest, Batman-iest smile in existence.

She says, “Clark, you’re a good friend.”

And then she turns and hurries off with her stolen goods, practically fleeing the room, leaving Clark floating and dumbstruck behind her. This, she assumes, would also be in character if Batman said anything caring while at a Justice League meeting, so she doesn’t worry about it too much.

She gets to the jet. She pulls off that _god awful suit,_ and she’s hardly sat down before the rest of her family is calling her over the comns.

Tim sounds breathless with laughter

“Steph, Steph, Bruce paralyzed _right_ after you complimented Clark and- oh my gods- Steph it’s _amazing-_ ”

“Did you take pictures?”

“ _So many._ My backups have back ups-”

Harper’s voice, cutting in.

“Dick just about had a conniption when you talked about having twenty children. He’s still cry-laughing in the corner. Alfred’s trying to make him calm down but he keeps bursting into new fits of cackling as soon as he starts to breathe normal again.”

She can _hear_ Jason smirking when he calls from a little farther away, “Good job, kid. Fantastic. You’ve got ol’ Brucie Boy _down.”_

She starts up the engines, running through protocol and double checking all the different systems as she goes, listening to chatter and laughter from all the way down on earth. Gods, she loves this ridiculous family of hers _._

Cullen’s voice refocuses her mind.

“Wait, are you actually planning on sharing any of that pie?”

Stephanie considers.

“I’ll share some with you, buddy, but only because you’re my favourite.”

The younger boy crows in victory and Tim lets out and indignant squak, everyone on the other side of the line letting out sounds of protest. Stephanie smirks, brings the jet up into the air, and starts the journey home.

One week later, it’s a very different person at the front of the room. Spoiler grins, suit a lovely shade of eggplant purple, standing on the table for… no particular reason. 

(Reason: It makes her feel tall. Also, _power move.)_

On the bright side, the rest of the family is showing significant improvement with the paralysis, only occasionally freezing up every few hours or so. On the downside, they are now entirely bright orange. They’re working on it.

But for now, Stephanie is still here.

The Justice League makes its slow and confused entrance. They sit down, looking for a 6’2” and 210lbs Batman, seeing only 5’5” girl clocking in at around 110lbs.

Their lost, confused faces bring warmth to her soul.

“Hey, everyone! How are you all doing today?”

So much confusion. She does her best to keep a straight face.

“Batman’s been out these last couple of weeks with the flu _, so_ I’ve been covering for him these last couple of meetings. He should be back next week, though, so-”

They’re nodding along. The entire group of these fully grown beings are all nodding along with her, not realizing the _implications-_

And then, one by one, they freeze, and _stare_ at her.

And Stephanie? She can’t help it.

Stephanie _laughs._


	5. now we're young enough to try (to build a better life)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/5/2020
> 
> *Title From Mars, Sleeping At Last*
> 
> Prompt: One where Damian is being bullied and no one realizes but then someone notices a change in his behavior so Duke/Tim/Jason(your pick) find out about it (MayZar)
> 
> WARNINGS for Animal abuse, bullying, and (past) abusive childhoods.

Damian is fine.

Damian is completely, utterly  _ fine.  _

He trains. He meditates. He takes care of his animals. At night, he escapes out into the streets, Batman at his side and hood pulled low.

He’s  _ fine.  _

New year, new school. They had pulled him out of the last one. Too many fights, too much destruction,  _ please, Dami, you can’t bring a sword to school- _

Damian thinks, sitting in a shadowed corner of the school yard, swallowing a packed lunch in small, careful, controlled bites, that he would have preferred another year of homeschooling. 

At least they have placed him in a higher grade. The work is still tedious, and boring, and repetitive. But it is better than it was, better than what the American Education System had offered at the beginning of fifth grade. He’d take the ninth grade classroom with it’s rowed desks and mild decorations over the fifth grade classroom with it’s obnoxious bright colours and circular ‘discussion’ tables  _ any day. _

(Take a bite. Swallow. Breathe. A kid laughs on the swings, legs pumping. Damian swings higher every night.)

But he would have also preferred the manor over any classroom entirely. The manor, with it’s warm library and window seats, with Alfred the Cat’s gentle purring and Alfred the Butler’s steady British lilt. The manor, where Damian could finish the obnoxious problem sets required by the online school and then Grayson would take him out and he could do some  _ real  _ learning, mastering accents and exploring philosophy and talking about literature of actual merit.

(Take a bite. Swallow. Breathe. There’s a group of boys staring at him from around the corner. Damian ignores them. He won’t give them the satisfaction of seeing a reaction.)

But that’s the problem isn’t it? Grayson is not here. Grayson is away on business, and he had pulled Damian tight and had told him to be good, had told him to be  _ safe,  _ and that he’d be back soon, but  _ Grayson. Wasn’t. Here.  _

There had been a dead mouse in his locker this morning. Yesterday it had been three flattened toads, pulled off the side of the road, pressed into the pages of his folder.

He buried them, all of them- including the various bugs and roaches that have been showing up all week, now- in the corner of the Wayne property. A tiny little plot of land for creatures of innocence touched by cruel hands. He did not name them. He did not shake.

The first day of class, the teacher had asked for them to share what they liked, one by one by one. 

Damian had thought,  _ Robin.  _ Damian had thought,  _ katanas.  _ Damian had thought, thinking of Grayson,  _ sunshine.  _

Outloud, he had said animals. All kinds of animals. Critters and mammals and reptiles, too. He has a cat, he explained at the teacher’s prompting, and a dog. He wants a snake.

(He does not mention Batcow or the others, because there were already snickers rising from the back, already sneers pulling because of this little  _ kid  _ in the classroom, talking about his  _ pets  _ of all things. Ha, how hilarious,  _ how hilarious-) _

(Damian does not think it’s very funny. Damian thinks he is already more grown and hardened than any of these snot-nosed ninth graders will ever be.) 

(He doesn’t say anything. He’s being  _ good. _ Good people don’t turn and smash children's noses in, no matter how terribly annoying they might be.) 

Classwork, schoolwork, essays. Damian does it all, quietly, effectively, efficiently. He prints his name on the top of each page. He speaks only when spoken to. He does not fidget. He does complain. He is, by all means, the perfect student. 

They corner him by the second day. Ninth graders, bean sprouts, gangly and long and growing still. Jealous, the twitch of their mouths say. Angry, their clenched fists snarl. Embarrassed, their eyes hiss, embarrassed that Damian is better and smarter than them all. 

He looks them in the eye. He has faced grown men three times his size and come out on top. He has taken down gangs, and criminals, and the worst the world has to offer. He himself has taken bullets to the chest, has had broken bones, been tortured and bruised black and blue.

There is blood on his hands. Not all of it is his own.

He wonders what they see, these boys, these untrained  _ children,  _ when they look at him. He wonders if they can see it in his eyes, somewhere, that he has killed.

Either way, the ninth grade boys come looking for a fight, but they never raise a single fist.

They try to get under his skin, with words, with taunts, but Damian lives with  _ Drake,  _ who knows how to hit pressure points with his sharp tongue better than anyone he’s ever known. Damian has lived with his mother, who manipulates words like they are clay. Damian crawls into the underbelly of Gotham every night: he is thick skinned. 

The schoolyard taunts of some petty fourteen year olds will not get to him.

But children can be cruel, he has figured out. Children can be  _ cruel- _

(“Animals,” he had said, “of all kinds.” He regrets it now.)

The first time he opens his locker to find a fistful of dead spiders, he figures it’s a coincidence, and brushes them gently into a spare plastic baggy. But he frowns, also, at these little dead hairy-legged things. So many people are afraid of spiders, even though they have done nothing wrong.

_ (He did nothing wrong-) _

But then comes the cockroaches. And the worms. Then comes the toads. And the  _ mouse. _

He asks for a new locker. He asks for a new lock. He asks if he can bring one from home, lets see little ninth grade boys try and get past something  _ Batman  _ designed-

They tell him no. They ask him  _ why. _ And Damian-

Damian has no words. He is not good, at asking for help. He can’t. He  _ won’t.  _

(The first instinct a baby has is to cry for help. Damian grew out of that quick.)

_ (Damian did not grow out of it. That is not something you are supposed to grow out of. It was trained out of him, beaten out of him, as a toddler then as a child then as a boy.  _ _ Do not ask for help _ _ , the world carved into his pudgy hands and soft brow,  _ _ for it will only hurt you. _

_ So he doesn’t.) _

Asking for help is a last cause, and it is only reserved for people who are  _ safe,  _ and as far as he is concerned the only truly safe person is  _ Grayson.  _

(Grayson, who would have already noticed by now that something is wrong. Grayson, who Damian does not need to ask, because the man can read him like a book. Grayson, who  _ isn’t here.) _

Damian shows no emotion. He starts bringing small cardboard boxes to school. He eats his lunch in small, careful, controlled bites.

He still feels sick.

Duke calls out before he enters the room.

“Damian?”

What he expects is this: a twelve year old already standing up and heading out the door by the time he’s entered it, something vague, official, and probably insulting sounding off his tongue. 

Instead, Duke enters the room and Damian is still in bed, headphones on and assorted pets curled around him in some sort of cuddle pile. The only one missing is Batcow, and that’s because Bruce has banned her from coming up to the upper floors of the house.

He takes another step in. And another.

Damian still doesn’t move.

And Duke… Duke is growing concerned.

Gently, carefully, he places a hand on the kid’s shoulder.

“Damia-?”

He’s on the floor with a knife held to his throat before he can blink. He didn’t even realize the kid  _ had  _ a knife, he thought Alfred had confiscated them all last week because of that one incident with Tim and the rubber duck. He had thought-

Damian is staring at him, eyes intent and bloody, body frozen with lithe,  _ dangerous _ tension. 

To almost anyone else, it would look like the twelve year old has every intention of splitting his throat open, and would do it with no regrets. 

But Duke has been living with the Waynes for a while, now, knows how their bodies work and glide and move. He’s starting to understand their little ticks, their little tells, and Damian-

Damian’s hands are shaking. A fine tuned tremor that would be almost impossible to tell if you weren’t looking for it, but there nonetheless.

“Damian,” Duke says, voice careful and soft, like he’s seen Dick use when someone’s having a panic attack, like he’s seen Dick use when  _ Damian’s  _ having a panic attack, “Are you okay?”

And the boy blinks, _ blinks. _

And then he’s off Duke, heading towards the door, gone before the older boy has properly gotten himself off the ground, an entourage of eager pets following behind him.

“Okay,” he tells himself, suddenly alone in a quiet room,“ _ okay-” _

Duke has successfully snuck up behind Damian exactly twice. Both times, the kid had been drugged as all hell and had been sleeping. Both times, Duke was doing his absolute best to be utterly silent.

This time, Duke had  _ called out his name, _ and Damian was  _ still  _ startled.

Something, he decides, is  _ up.  _

A teacher stops Damian before he can step into the classroom for homeroom.

“Hey, Damian, would you please go clean out your locker for me? It smells like you accidentally left your lunch over the weekend.”

Damian nods, turns, and leaves. There is something cold in his gut, sinking like a rock.

He did not leave his lunch behind over the weekend. 

His steps are steady, smooth. Damian counts the tiles as he goes. He shows no reaction. He is being  _ good.  _

(He had called Dick last night. In seconds,  _ seconds,  _ the older man had asked if he was okay, had noticed something was wrong, he didn’t even need to see his  _ face _ . And Damian had opened his mouth and closed it, opened his mouth and closed it, because he could handle this, he could, and asking for help was a last case scenario. And Damian had wanted to prove, he had wanted to show that he was- better now. That he could do this. That he was no longer that enraged out of control ten year old who brought swords to school. He had wanted Dick to be  _ proud, and _ -) 

(And then he had lied.)

Damian gets to his locker. He puts down his bag. Inside, there is a cardboard box.

He opens the lock,  _ tick, tick, tick- _

He swings the metal door open.

His eyes zero in on what’s inside.

And then he slams the whole thing shut. 

Distantly, he hears laughter. Distantly, he hears a teacher asks if anything’s wrong.

“Nothing,” says Damian, “just very mouldy forgotten lunch.”

It’s not. 

There’s a cat in his locker. More of a kitten, judging by its size, hardly even grown. It’s grey and lean and it looks like Alfred, except it’s all torn up,  _ it’s all torn up  _ and-

And-

Animal torture, like this, is one of the signs of the homicidal triad. He wonders, distantly, if the boy who did this has ever set fires. He wonders if he’s ever been burned.

There’s a dead cat in his locker. Stiff and cold and gone. It looks like Alfred, who curls up on his lap on lazy summer evenings and lets him hold too tight as he shakes his way through flashbacks and terrible, hazy nightmares.

There’s a dead cat in his locker. There’s a  _ dead cat  _ in his locker. There’s a-

The bell rings, jarrs him out of his thoughts, makes him inhale sharply. Quickly, he opens the door, places the creature as gently as he can into a shoe box, and then closes everything back up. 

His hands are shaking. They are covered in blood and it is not his own. 

Damian walks back to class.

Lunchtime, and Damian sits in the shaded corner. Emotionless.

He takes small, careful, controlled bites of his lunch. 

(Take a bite. Swallow. Breathe. Somewhere, in the corner, he can hear jeering.)

There’s a dead cat in his locker.

(Take a bite. Swallow. Breathe. The sun is shining. It reminds him of Grayson. Grayson is not here.)

There’s a dead cat in his locker. It looks like Alfred the Cat.

(Take a bite. Swallow. Breathe. Breathe.  _ Breathe.) _

_ There’s a dead cat in his locker and it looks like Alfred- _

Damian stands up. He puts his lunch down. He turns, walks into the school building, down the long corridor, and into a stall.

He throws everything back up.

(“Animals,” he had said, “of all kinds. I have a cat-”)

_ (He regrets it now.) _

Duke finds him in the afternoon, still in his uniform, digging a shallow grave. There’s a shoebox to his right, and Duke does not ask what’s inside.

For a while, no one says anything. Everything is quiet except for the distant sounds of nature, wind rushing through the trees and birds softly chirping.

Damian takes the box. Carefully lowers the small creature into its final resting place.

Duke expects him to cover it up in dirt right away. He expects the younger boy to continue pragmatically on, fistful, by fistful, by fistful.

But he doesn’t.

Instead, Damian clears his throat.

“There was a cat,” he says in a small voice, slowly, carefully, controlled, “A stray. It found my window and I was young, and foolish, and I gave it a bit of my evening meal. And it came back. It came back  _ every night. _ And every night I would feed it, just a small portion. Just a scrap. And it would sit on my bed and let me pet it, even when my hands would shake.”

His hands are shaking now.

“And one day, my mother- she. She saw the cat. She saw it coming into my room. And caring, caring is a weakness, it is  _ always, always  _ a weakness, with her, and there was a knife, and she told me, and she said that I had to- I had to, and I- I-”

Damian swallows. Looks down at the shallow grave.

“The next time a stray came to my window, I sent it away without any dinner.”

( _ Do not ask for help, for it will only hurt you.) _

It’s hard to picture Damian any smaller than he already is. But Duke tries, he tries to imagine small pudgy hands and a little button nose, the way the kid’s eyes would be rounder and wider and less haunted. It makes him want to weep. It makes him want to punch Talia Al Ghul in the face. 

Duke does neither. 

Instead, he kneels on the wet earth besides Damian, picks up handfuls of dirt, and covers the shallow grave fistful by fistful by fistful. Then, slowly, carefully, he tugs the kid into a loose hug, holds him close, digs his chin into soft downy hair.

If the younger boy’s hands shake, he does not mention it.

Tomorrow, Damian will walk into school and there will be nothing in his locker. Tomorrow, Duke will pay a visit to some parents, the principal, a group of soon to be terrified teenage boys. 

(Damian said he would be good. Duke made no such promises.)

Tomorrow, Duke will deal with this, all of this. Will sit down and have a talk with Bruce, will call Dick and explain the situation, will do what he can-

Tomorrow.

But today Duke holds Damian close, and tries to convince him without any words that there is healing even for the lies carved into your youth. That there is healing from the worst of things.

That there is healing, _ there is healing, _ even from this.


	6. here i am (this is me)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 6/1/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Here I Am, Bryan Adams* 
> 
> I was working on a prompt and nothing was working right so instead I just wrote Cass and Harper sisterly feels and I have no regrets. :/
> 
> WARNINGS: Talk about scars and rough childhoods and the trauma associated with it, though mostly in a soft and distant way.

Harper lands on the mat. Hard.

She closes her eyes. Tilts her head up, trying to get more air in. She’s sweating up a storm, the fabric of her shirt clinging to her back, hair greasy and limp.

 _“How,”_ she pants, “ _are you so good at this?”_

Cass, besides her, shrugs. There is a little smile playing on her face, dark eyes watching Harper with a sort of strange intensity that never fails to make her feel x-rayed. Cass reads people like an open book, carves them to their bone marrow and leans in close to study the atoms clashing. 

It makes Harper want to hide, some days. Makes her want to run. There are scars carved in her bones that nobody should know of. That no one should have in the first place.

But life isn’t fair. That’s why she's doing this, isn’t it? Because life isn’t fair and there are more monsters than the ones hiding beneath your skin. Because maybe Harper wraps up all her shattered parts deep in her chest but maybe some other little girl growing up _might not have to._

Harper breathes. She stands. 

Elegantly, silently, Cass stands too. There are pale lines carved up and down nearly every inch of her exposed skin. They must have hurt, once. They must have bled. 

Harper doesn’t ask.

Instead, she says, “Okay, okay, I’m ready to go again.”

The raven haired teen nods, once, settles her feet wide and open. Graceful, like a dancer. 

But then again, graceful is named for panthers, too. 

Harper doesn’t try to emulate that grace. She knows it’s not her strength. She grew up fighting in the streets and the style stays with her, even now, dirty and quick and rigorous. Smack the opponent down before you get too damaged. Smack the opponent down fast and make sure they stay there because otherwise there will be hell to pay.

(And if you can’t beat them, smack them down long enough to run. _Run.)_

Harper breathes. And Cass comes swinging, almost too fast for the eye to follow, barely leaving any time for Harper to dodge, leaving her no room for offense of any kind. 

Street fighting isn’t meant for sparring. It’s not meant for this well-lit cavern with it’s soft plush mats and well outlined rules. Street fighting is meant for shadows, and darkness, for dirt thrown in the eyes and barring your teeth.

Street fighting isn’t meant for heroes.

And yet, here she is.

_Dodge, duck, swerve. Throw a punch? Blocked, blocked again, dive to the side and come back kicking-_

Cass has her in a choke hold in seconds.

_Breathe._

Cass stands up. Harper breathes. There is sweat on her fingertips. There are monsters underneath her skin.

She wants to be stronger. She wants to be _better._ Harper is not afraid of the dark but only because she has been fighting it all her life. Harper is not afraid of the dark, but only because she has to be. 

And yet, here she is.

“Again,” she says, because her muscles are sore and aching and Cass has hardly even broken a sweat. Because she’s supposed to be _better than this-_

But the other girl shakes her head, a twitch of a frown pulling at her lips, something like kindness in her eyes, something like regret. 

Harper protests. Harper stands up and complements just charging the other teen. The adrenaline is pumping and there’s something in her chest itching for a fight, itching to prove herself, itching for _something-_

But Cass shakes her head, shakes her head, lips thin and tight, stance open.

“No,” she says, this girl of so few words, and Harper knows better than not to listen.

So they shower. They change. Cass has sunflowers on her socks, and she wiggles her toes and smiles at them, like they’re something special. Perhaps they are.

Harper doesn’t ask.

But before she can express any gratitude or farewells, before she can head off into the great manor and find Cullen- Cass stops her.

“Come,” she says, “Read to me. Please.”

And Harper knows better not to listen.

It’s awkward. Strange. Cass curls up next to her like a cat, eyes intent on the book in her hands like there are miracles hidden between the lines. _Britt Marie Was Here_ is printed neatly on the front cover, an old woman making her way through the pages, hardworking and broken and kind.

She remembers doing this a few times, with her brother. Sounding out syllables with a child’s tongue and making up voices just to see him laugh. That was a long time ago.

Even now, Harper does not have a good reading voice. She stumbles awkwardly over words and has to clear her throat often. She says things with the wrong intonation, loses her spot on the page and has to start a paragraph over again. 

And yet, here she is. 

Falling down and getting up. Again, again, again.

Later, Cass will tell her in broken tones of a man with a voice like lightning, harsh and crackling and cruel. Of a girl who had her words taken away from her, who had nothing on her tongue and still chose to refute. Cass will tell her stories of the scars paving her skin like shallow rivers, of someone who was a monster wearing his own skin. Of a girl who was a monster until she carved herself anew.

Later, Cass will grip Harper’s hands too tight with haunted determined eyes and tell her _“Always a choice_ ,” like it is a sacred mantra carved into her every pore.

Perhaps it is. 

And Harper will listen, and her chest will ache, and there are stories in her lungs not yet ready to be told. 

And yet, _here she is._

What a miracle it is to be breathing in a world that has always sought to bring you down. What a miracle is it that these girls, these teens, these fine young women, that they are here and living still. 

Falling down and getting up. Again, again, again. 

How strange and terrible and human, perseverance is. How aching. How beautiful.

“A human being,” Harper reads, soft and slow and stumbling, “may not choose her circumstances, but she does choose her actions.”

Cass listens. Stories are things meant to be told.

(This is what perseverance is: saying again and again that there is a story carved into your chest and it is worthy of being told, all the long days of your existence, just because you are here.)

(This is what perseverance is: a choice.)

Harper reads. Cass listens. Kindnesses and mercies and miracles, all wrapped up into growing girls of scars and skin and bone. 

Together and healing, and breathing still. 

Hear their stories told, because they have fought all their lives to be here to tell them.

Harper stumbles and falls. Again, again, again.

And yet, here she is.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Britt Marie Was Here is basically my favourite book of all time, and if you haven't read it I IMPLORE you to pick it up, because I am of the firm believe it is life changing.
> 
> Also, Harper is a good bean. Hope I did her justice.


	7. cause i'll doze off safe and soundly (but i'll miss your arms around me)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/7/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Vanilla Twilight, by Owl City*
> 
> Warnings: Referenced Child Neglect

Tim creeps down the stairs. One foot, then another. He is desperately,  _ desperately _ hoping not to hear anything creak.

But he doesn’t know Wayne Manor, Not like he knows his own house. He hasn’t explored every nook or cranny. He’s not it’s ward, it’s not  _ home. _

He’s just staying the night.

Just one night, of course. Because- well. Because that’s what he told Bruce. 

“Won’t your parents worry?” Batman had asked, eyes narrowed under the cowl, and Tim had been halfway through a document, finishing his report, and he had responded without thinking.

“Business trip. They won’t miss me.”

And Bruce had gotten that  _ look  _ again, the one that screamed of displeasure, the one that was almost angry. It made something go tight and hard and small in Tim’s chest. It made his heart pound.

“You mean you're home alone?”

Again,  _ again,  _ that tone. Tim had stared at the document in his hand, even though his eyes refuse to read the words. He had breathed, shoulders hunching, tried not to crumple the paper.

Tim hates the look. He hates it. Because the look means that something’s  _ wrong _ and Tim doesn’t know how to  _ fix it  _ and-

And Tim can take care of himself.

So he lied. 

“They’re only gone for one night. They’ll be back tomorrow. I can manage.”

It’s an easy lie to tell. He used to whisper it to himself every night, hiding under his covers in the dark. Tomorrow, they’ll be back. Tomorrow, he won’t be alone. Tomorrow,  _ tomorrow- _

But that’s not important. The important thing is that Bruce accepted it. Nodded. Grunted. Said, awkwardly, quietly, “Well, then. You can stay here and we’ll send you back in the morning.”

Tim  _ froze. _

This was not the way this conversation was supposed to go. Bruce was supposed to have brushed it off, let it be. Tim was supposed to go back home to the empty Drake household and wile away his mornings with whatever entertainment he could get his hands on. And then the next evening he’d creep back to Wayne Manor. And the next evening. And the next. 

Bruce wasn’t supposed to offer to let him  _ stay.  _

And yet Tim found himself nodding. Found himself  _ agreeing,  _ and now-

And now, well, now he’s here. Walking down unfamiliar stairs, trying to find the kitchen in the dead of night because the nightmares won’t leave him alone and he’s tired and one of his classmates had once mentioned his parents making hot cocoa after a bad dream and well-

Tim doesn’t really have any parents to make hot chocolate after nightmares. But he’s got his own two hands and a recipe he copied off from a book in the local library and he’s willing to make it work.

That’s the plan, anyway.

Except he creeps into the kitchen and blinks and startles and freezes because  _ somebody’s already there.  _

He hardly dares to breathe.

And then-

“Timmy? That you?”

He knows that voice. He  _ knows  _ that voice. Dick’s voice, a bit tired and sad, but welcoming still. Like a dash of sunshine on an early spring morning. Something good, and kind.

It still takes more courage than it should to step all the way into the light.

“Hi, Dick.”

The older boy smiles, crooked and real, reaches out for Tim and pulls him into a sleepy hug. It’s so  _ warm,  _ here, wrapped up in Dick’s arms. Warm, and foreign. 

He soaks it all up, trying to memorize the way it feels, that sense of security and comfort, how Dick’s shoulder presses into his cheek. Dick’s humming something, softly, rocking a little back and forth, the only sound filling the room.

Tim’s tired. His eyes are scratchy from lack of sleep, his heart only just now starting to slow from it’s nightmare induced pounding. He thinks, if Dick kept it up long enough, he could drop off right here, in the faded kitchen lights and with the cold tiles under his feet.

But all good things come to an end. Dick eventually draws away, keeping a soft grip on his upper arms, blue eyes scrutinizing him.

Tim tries not to squirm Tries to smile. Desperately, desperately resists the urge to collapse back into that warm secure cocoon and melt into it forever, because hugs are a gift and he may or may not be a little terrified that asking for more than he’s given will result in them being taken away completely.

Dick, being Dick, sees right through him. Pulls him into another hug. Hums, quietly, “Nightmare?”

“How did you know?”

A chuckle: soft, ruffling his hair.

“I am a man of many talents.”

The older man pulls back once more, stands up, but not before leaning down and looking Tim right in the face, eyes twinkling. 

“One of those talents,” he says, smiling too gentle and smiling too kind, “is the perfect nightmare cure.”

“Can I help?”

“If you want.”

He does. Want. So he creeps up by Dick’s side, watches him measure out butter and cocoa powder and sugar. Watches him take out the milk.

“Wait-” and there’s something excited bubbling in his chest, something hopeful, “Wait, are you making hot chocolate?”

Dick winks, nudges him with his hip.

“An excellent deduction. We’ll make a detective out of you yet.”

“I already  _ am  _ a detective. I mean- I found you, didn’t I?”

A pause. The older man has Tim stir ingredients in a pot, round and round and round, breaking down their separate chemical properties and melding them all together into something new.

“I suppose you did.”

It’s quiet, for a while, but not the kind of silence that lingers in every hollow space too big back at home. This is a comfortable quiet, warm, filled with the wordless interactions of two people making something together. It feels like a hug, almost, from the entire universe. And Tim wishes, selfishly, foolishly, that it could always be like this.

They drink hot chocolate in mismatched mugs, and it tastes better homemade than when he just uses the packets. More wholesome, somehow. He’s beginning to believe there’s some merit to his classmate’s stories.

Dick asks about how his summer is going, about training, about  _ Robin,  _ and Tim answers, words spilling from his tongue like a waterfall, because there’s so much he wants to say and who knows when he’ll get another chance to say it? His parents aren’t back for a week and Bruce isn’t much of a conversation-starter, and Tim hardly knows how to get one going himself and so-

So-

So Dick, with his twinkling eyes and sunshine smile, who asks, and-  _ listens. _ Listens so easily to anything Tim has to say, no matter how non essential and mundane it is. It’s a gift, and he will take advantage of it as long as the offer stands.

And at the end of it all, mugs washed and pot rinsed, Dick stops him before he heads off to bed.

“Hey,” he says, something soft and wistful in his tone, “you know you can find me, right? If you’re having a nightmare, or you need a talk, or if you just want to hang out for a while. I’m here for you.  _ You know that _ , right?”

Tim swallows. Hard. 

He wants to say no. He wants to ask  _ why.  _ He wants to push out a claim that it doesn’t matter, that he can handle everything by himself because he’s been doing it his entire life and he’s sees no point in changing now.

But he doesn’t. 

Instead he nods, tight, controlled. There’s this feeling in his chest and it refuses to leave, a sort of yearning, desperate and embarrassing and-

And-

“Yeah,” he says, “okay.”

Dick looks relieved. Looks tired. Looks lost.

“Good, good. Okay. I’m going to tuck you in, now. It’s part of the nightmare cure. Essential to the whole process. Can’t skip it.”

The bed Tim is sleeping in is piled to the brim with blankets and pillows. He made a nest of it, earlier, curled up in the center so as to feel safe and surrounded by all sides.

When he curls back into it and peeks up at Dick, he feels embarrassed and awkward, shifting nervously under the soft duvet as the older boy deftly tucks him in, surveying his work with a critical eye. 

And then-

And then Dick leans forward and  _ presses a kiss to his forehead, _ murmurs a goodnight with a smile and leaves the room, like what he did was nothing. Like it was  _ normal.  _

Tim is frozen, staring at the ceiling, caught in the sensation. He wonders, distantly, if his mother ever did this when he was small. If she tucked him in when he was a baby. If she kissed his forehead. He wonders if it would have been absent minded as the one just gifted to him, if it would have been as tender and gentle,.

He wonders.

But mostly, mostly, his eyelids are heavy and his stomach is full. The nightmare has all but been forgotten, only half there shadows in the shaded night, distant and unable to touch him. It’s as if Dick has casted some sort of magic spell, as ridiculous as that may sound, declaring him safe from all harm.

There is something soft and warm in his chest. He wants to curl around it and keep it there, forever and ever and ever, until the rest of the world fades away.

But one night will have to do.

(Tim has lived with less.)

He closes his eyes.

He sleeps.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i have a great homemade cocoa recipe if anyone's interested


	8. we're gonna stay strong, hold true (and everybody's gonna watch what we do)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/8/2020
> 
> *Title From All My Friends, Owl City*
> 
> (Can you tell I'm having and Owl City kick?)
> 
> PROMPT: I really like the idea of Dick doing non stop acrobatics over the simplest things and unnervingly using his flexibility over things he could do like a normal person while the rest of the family tries to make him stop. He is in public. He’ll traumatize the children. Think of the poor children, Dickie, their innocence shattered because you keep acting like a B-grade horror movie monster.  
> The whole thing ends up in the news after it blew up, like everything does with the Batfam (Sarourat)
> 
> No Warnings. :)

It starts innocently enough.

Dick is nine years old. A year under his belt as Bruce’s ward, laughing and smiling bright. He clings to Bruce like a koala bear and does flips when he’s happy for no apparent reason other than he wants to.

And this is fine. Obviously. 

_Obviously._

But they’ll be out and about with each other, stopping at ice cream parlours and visiting museums, and Dick’s muscles will just- forget. For some reason. That they’re supposed to belong to a human being and not some strange monkey child.

They’ll be going to a restaurant and the boy will roll over the top of his chair and slide into his seat, fast as a blink of an eye and seemingly completely unaware that he did anything unusual. They’ll be in the park and walking down the pathway, only for a bench to be in Dick’s way and instead of, well, _stepping around,_ the kid goes into a casual handstand and walks across the narrow back of it. They’ll be munching on fries and his ward will delight in contorting his frame to stretch his arm in as many loops as possible while still being able to get the wedge into his mouth, calling out a happy little, “Bruce, look!” with every successful pretzel. 

They talk about secret identities. About being careful with the image they present to the press. Dick nods solemnly, but the very next time they’re out and about Bruce catches the boy gleefully showing off to a green-looking waitress how practically every bone in his body is double jointed.

But Dick is nine. He’s small and young and still getting used to living outside of the circus. 

_He’ll grow out of it,_ the older man thinks to himself, staring as his child takes the concrete traffic poles as a personal challenge, scrambling on top of one domed surface and then leaping on to the next, keeping time with Bruce’s own long strides and adding any number of flashy twists and flips while airborne.

Dick does not grow out of it.

Fourteen years old, and Dick Grayson grins at the small gathering of children and parents who have been drawn to his display. Somewhere, to his right, Wally is covering his eyes and cursing the universe. 

He ignores it. This entire situation was Wally’s fault, because the older teen had taken one look at the picture on Dick’s phone and had gone, “No. No way. You can’t do _that._ ”

But Dick _can_ do that, and dropped right into a DeMarlo pose just to prove it.

A kid had taken noticed. Had _stared,_ eyes bright and curious. And, well, he had a duty to the younger generation, to teach them and lead them forth to the future. Who was he to deny them such great knowledge?

So he had called out, “Hi!” and now they were here.

“So,” says Dick, as Wally quietly dies inside, “once you’ve mastered _this_ pose, it’s pretty easy to switch it around and transition into _this_ pose.”

A parent gasps. A little boy, watching with _very_ wide eyes as Dick bends into a human knot while balancing on the palms of his hands, glances down at his own legs as if they might be hiding some sort of magical snake demons. 

Dick can only grin wider, tapping the top of his head with the heel of his foot, then slowly sliding both feet lower down his back. An older sister’s hand tightens on her charge, and she whispers, quietly, “ _Oh Jesus-”_

“Dude,” Wally hisses, sounding more than a little desperate, “ _dude,_ stop, you’re traumatising the children. Think of the poor children, Dickie, they’re gonna have nightmares. _I’m_ going to have nightmares.”

Laughter is the only response the redhead receives.

After a few more minutes of instruction, leading the kids through a few simple poses and displaying some more complicated contortions, Dick finally rolls up to a standing position and allows Wally to drag him away, waving goodbye behind his shoulder and grinning brightly all the while.

Bruce, watching the shaky videos onlookers had taken and wincing through the inevitable media coverage over _Brucie Wayne’s ward still acting like he’s part of the circus,_ ponders the situation.

Perhaps he should take authoritative action. Perhaps the pair of them should have another talk. There’s any number of things Bruce can do in this situation.

But Dick’s fourteen. He’s young and attention seeking, yes, but that’s just a teenager thing to do. He’s just showing off for his friend, nothing more to it.

 _He’ll grow out of it,_ Bruce thinks, watching as his ward casually takes a diving leap off of the head of the T-Rex and land neatly on the cement floor seconds later in order to tell him that dinner’s ready, and it only sounds a little bit pleading inside of his own mind. 

Dick doesn’t grow out of it.

Dick Grayson doesn’t often get drunk. He doesn’t have the time, or even truly any care for it. At most, at a casual event among friends, he might get tipsy. 

But there’s a stage. There’s a _stage,_ right before drunk and just past tipsy, in which Dick starts breaking out the old circus moves en masse.

And sometimes there are exceptions.

Cullen’s face is set and determined in the bright lights of the gala, and besides him Barbera rolls expertly through the crowds, clearing a path. They’ve been sent to diffuse the situation that has arisen- mostly the fact that Dick has taken off his shoes and is drinking his champagne with the stem of his glass between his toes.

“ _How,_ ” the teen asks, watching as the older man takes a delicate sip, “does he _do that?”_

“Practice,” says Barbera, “lots, and _lots_ of practice.”

They continue to stare, enraptured, as the conversation Dick and the woman he is talking too becomes more and more engaged, the pair of them talking fast and excitedly, telling grander and grander stories with every passing minute. 

Dick is still drinking using the wrong appendages, but now he’s also gesturing and talking with his hands. But even _that_ isn’t quite normal, every limb swinging out just a bit too far, spreading a bit too wide-

Strangely unnerved, Cullen whispers, “It’s like watching a B-grade horror movie.”

A quiet shrug in response.

“That’s one way of describing it.”

Dick has started making avid use of his double joints. It only adds to the effect.

“How are we going to _stop_ him?”

“Oh,” the redhead grins, and Cullen decides then and there that he never wants this woman as an enemy, “that’s _easy.”_

And then she gently nudges him three steps to the left, in the perfect position for him to be in Dick’s line of sight next time he looks up.

And he’s lost, a little bit, confused. How is this supposed to _help._ He looks to his right, hoping Barbera might explain herself, but she’s _gone,_ just like that, wheelchair and all. 

And then, just as suddenly, he turns back to look for Dick and the man is _there,_ beaming like Cullen is the most brilliant thing to have ever stepped on the face of the earth, and pulling him in for a hug.

Cullen… is not great with hugs. With touch. That is pretty much reserved for Harper alone.

But this is embrace is loose, easy to get out of and easy to break. And it's certainly more welcome than the random members of the crowd brushing past him, so he lets it go on, listening to Dick babble about how _awesome_ their whole family is, how much he loves everyone, and on and on and on-

Absentmindedly, Cullen brings a hand up to poke at Dick’s bicep. It certainly _feels_ real, human flesh and bone, but sometimes watching the older man gives the bewildering assumption the man is made of rubber.

But nope, nope. He’s just flexible and crazy talented.

Speaking of…

“Cullen, Cullen, hey, you wanna see me do a trick?”

Cullen agrees without thinking, and watching Dick scramble up the walls of the ballroom and up to the rafters with nothing but his _bare hands_ and an assortment of flips is more than worth the lecture.

Bruce tries to put a spin on it: Dick’s in his early twenties. He’s young, having fun, and pulling stupid stunts is just a part of the deal. 

_He’ll grow out of it,_ he thinks, watching Dick casually twist both his arms so that his palms were flat on the counter in front of him but his elbows were facing up, and it sounds more resigned than anything.

Stephanie reaches the climax of her story, and Dick, while he’s laughing, leans all his weight on his hands and curls his legs up to his chest. 

None of the other kids even bat an eyelash. Why would they? Dick Grayson is a man who laughs at gravity and the laws of physics, who carries his heritage with pride. It’s a coin flip as to whether he’ll walk into a room on his hands or on his feet and cartwheels are his favourite mode of travel. He’s impossible, and stubborn, and _brilliant_ in all the ways that make him _him._

Dick Grayson never grows out of it.

And if Bruce is going to be honest with himself, he may complain and grumble, but he wouldn’t have it any other way.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Contortion Examples:  
> https://www.contortionistsunite.com/contortion-poses/
> 
> Dick Grayson in Real Life:  
> https://writtenskyes.tumblr.com/post/189876505081/no-one-absolutely-no-one-dick-grayson-source#notes
> 
> HOT COCOA RECIPE:  
> Two tablespoon of butter  
> Two-three tablespoons of cocoa  
> Quarter Cup To Half Cup of sugar (depends on how sweet you want it)  
> Quarter cup of milk.
> 
> Add it into a pot with the heat on medium. Mix together until everything combined. Then gradually add MORE milk to the concoction until you have enough to serve however many people are drinking. (About a cup each?). Heat through everything while stirring consistently.
> 
> The flavor holds pretty well no matter how much milk you add, and it's a really strong and rich hot chocolate, to the point that even if there's not a ton in a mug you're still satisfied. It's also a pretty easy recipe to alter. 
> 
> My family is a bunch of sweet tooths and it's pretty large, so I usually do half a cup of sugar and three tablespoons of cocoa, and then add a BUNCH of milk. If it's too sweet for you, though, then just reduce sugar from a quarter cup to an eighth cup with one tablespoon of butter. It also tastes good still if you make it vegan with alternative butter/milk!
> 
> Anyways yeaaaah. Hope you enjoy <3


	9. love, if your wings are broken borrow mine so yours can open too (cause i'm gonna stand by you)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 9/1/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title is Stand By You, Rachel Platten*
> 
> Prompt: Hmm… how about one where Tim goes all Joker Junior and the rest of the fam help him recover? (Forestfire34720)
> 
> WARNINGS: Trauma, guilt, non-graphic self harm, and Joker being an utter monster with Tim cracking under pressure.

Tim hasn’t stopped laughing.

It’s not a happy cheerful laugh. Not a giggle or a chuckle. It’s not- good. This. It’s a gasping painful thing wrenched from the chest and Bruce wants to cringe, hearing it. Wants to punch something till his knuckles bleed.

He can hear Dick and Jason, arguing in the back. Nightwing’s soft, pleading words and Red Hood’s rough curses. Tim continues to thrash and struggle, despite their holds. He's writhing, a bloody mess, scratching at the older boys’ hold.

Laughing.

_ On and on and on- _

Bruce is going to hear it in his dreams, this. He’s going to hear that shattering laughter, the way that it hitches with every inhale, the way it chokes out and comes again. It sounds like Tim is crying, even as he cackles and shrieks. It sounds like he’s dying, back there.

His hands are knuckle-white on the wheel. Nightwing, in the back, mumbles, “Oh, Tim,  _ Tim-” _

And Bruce drives faster.

The first day is spent laughing and screaming in intervals, insults slewing from his mouth like an avalanche. Tim only falls silent when Bruce tranquilizes him, leaving him collapsed on the ground, small and terrible in the stark lights.

By the second day, Tim’s throat refuses to give anything more than a rasp. The young man still laughs silently, a too wide grin splitting his face, eyes manic and gestures violent.

The third day, he’s spiralled into frantic mutterings, pacing back and forth in the small enclosure, pulling at his own hair and shrieking if anyone approaches the glass. There are scabs pulling around the edges of his lips. His eyes have started to fill with something haunted and distant.

The fourth day, Tim is manic again, scrambles and yells and laughs like a madman, tears at his own skin with his fingers and sobs all the while.

And then the fifth day he goes still and quiet, laying down in the containment unit filled with padded walls and shaking without a sound, save for an occasional wretched giggle that escapes from his tongue unheeded.

It’s a nightmare, watching him fall apart like this, unable to reason, unable to  _ think.  _ They administer antidote upon antidote and make sure he gets nutrients and stays hydrated, but for the most part all of them are helpless. They can do many things, but help rebuild a mind is not one of them, and so they have to stand on the outside and just watch this poor boy deconstruct from the inside out.

Jason has left by the third day, something hard and haunted in his gaze, shaking fingers tucked away in tight fists. He knows the kind of madness that consumes everything in your soul except your shattered mind. He knows how it claws at your undersides, burns fire in your veins and makes the whole wide world fill with shadows trying to swallow you whole.

(He knows about being a broken bird in the hands of a madman, but everyone tries not to think about that.)

Bruce and Alfred throw themselves into their work , Dick frets, Cassandra trains too hard, and Duke leaves the house for hours at a time. Damian, an opposite, recludes into his room. Harper wanders- quiet, pensive, afraid- and Cullen lets her hold his hand too tight.

Stephanie- she watches. That’s her  _ best friend _ there, a brother in all but blood and her partner in crime. She has watched this young man grow up, has watched him laugh and cry and fight with every fiber of his being. She has seen him fall apart at his very seams and build himself back up. 

She has left him, before. She has her own issues and insecurities, her own scarred lifetime carved under her skin. Sometimes, even the closest of friends cannot be there for you.

But she’s here, this time. She’s  _ here. _

And she won’t leave him behind. Not again. Not this time. 

Tim shakes and aches and breathes too fast and then too slow. He lays there, curled into himself and silent, scratching at his own arms and trying to sort out the fragments of his mind.

Sometimes, she thinks, he starts crying, but all that comes out is that terrible, terrible  _ laugh. _

She had been there, when they had found him. Had seen that too wide smile, the way that choking laughter mingled with the Joker’s maniacal one, the smeared makeup covering up the face of a friend. 

Tim had looked scared. He had looked insane. 

He had looked like the Joker, and it was disturbing no matter how much she wished she could just get past it.

But she forces herself not to care. She sits outside the glass and breathes and waits, stays up through quiet nights and screamed ones, and she watches. Makes her presence known in every way she can

Stephanie has spent enough time with this boy to realize that what he fears most in the world is being abandoned, to realize that every good thing that comes his way always seems to slip through his fingers. 

So she stays. She stays, and watches, and with every passing moment she’s calling without words  _ you’re not alone, you’re not alone, you’re not alone- _

Six days past. Seven. Antidotes and IV lines. Early mornings and late nights. The tremors stop, and then the laughter, and then the sobs. Until Tim just lays there, breathing deep and even, controlling what few things he can.

Bruce, bags under his eyes deep, tells her to leave the boy alone until he initiates contact. The older man knows better than most how healing sometimes means retreating inside you own mind, figuring out how to live with yourself in the wake of circumstances out of your control.

But Stephanie is not Bruce. She is young and bright and furious, and on the third day of silence on Tim’s part, curled away from her and refusing to acknowledge her existence, she unlocks the door and creeps inside.

“Don’t.”

The word is scratchy, escaping from the prone figure on the floor before she even takes a full step in.

Stephanie ignores it, closes the door behind her.

“You can’t tell me what to do. Tim-”

_ “Don’t.” _

Stephanie falls silent. 

She feels lost, out of her depth. Exhausted, if she’s going to be honest. Scared.

But she made a promise to this boy. She had called out  _ you are not alone  _ and she had meant it. 

She steps closer. Closer. No one deserves to be alone when the worse things happen. 

And then, as if she has passed some invisible barrier, Tim whips around and  _ snarls  _ at her. 

His blue orbs, usually so bright, are glazed red and hollow. The bags under his eyes are deep and his face far too thin. He looks pissed off and terrified and shattered beyond repair, but it’s the first proper eye contact he’s made in over a week and Stephanie labels it progress because it sure as hell isn’t nothing.

“Go  _ away.  _ Go away, I don’t want you near me, _ I don’t want you-” _

“Tim.”

Her voice is too big, in the remaining silence, even though she had hardly spoken above a whisper. Her best friend’s hands have started to shake, and he lifts them to press against his chest, ducks his head and lets his too-long bangs draw a shadowy curtain over his features, averting his gaze.

“Just leave me alone, Steph,  _ please.” _

“You know I won’t.”

He won’t look at her. He won’t look at her, and his hands are shaking, and it’s such a pitiful, heartbreaking picture she wants to reach out, to hold him tight and never let go- 

But she knows better. So she sits. And she waits. And she watches.

Tim is staring at his own trembling fingers, resting loosely in his lap. His breathing is tight and controlled. His shoulders heave.

“I hurt people,” he whispers, and trembling fingers curl into fists, “I  _ hurt  _ people and I- I could hurt  _ you. _ I could, and-”

Stephanie watches him try to pull everything back together, to compartmentalize, to find some sort of order in all this madness. She breathes and scootches closer, breathes and reaches out, cups his face and makes him look at her.

“I’m not scared of you,” she says, and she keeps her voice even and her eyes calm, “and you are not a monster.”

Tim’s eyes are wet.

Stephanie keeps talking.

“This is not your fault. This will never, ever be your fault in a million billion years. And I know there are voices in your head telling you otherwise, but know that no one blames you, no one hates you, and that we all love you  _ so freaking much.  _ This whole place has gone crazy, worrying about you. And we’re here. We’re  _ all  _ here, and we have every intention of staying.”

She swallows, hard.

“You’re not alone, Tim. You don’t have to handle this all by yourself. You’ve got me. You’ve got  _ us _ . We’re here for you.  _ We love you.  _ I promise.”

They curl into each other, right there on the floor. Her shoulder is getting damp from Tim’s ugly sobs, but she’s sure Tim’s own shirt isn’t faring much better because she’s got tears of her own. 

Their hug isn’t gentle. It’s this grasping, desperate thing, a sort of needy reassurance that the other is alive and still here. And they press themselves against each other and they hold on as tight as they can, because everyone knows that monsters are always better faced together than alone. 

“You’re going to be okay, Tim,” she whispers into his hairline, and Tim shakes and doesn’t agree.

But he doesn’t disagree either. And _ that’s not nothing. _

The next morning, Dick finds them, and he sighs and he covers his eyes because when did he get  _ so damn old _ . Then he slips inside the cell and curls around the both of them. Tim’s eyes opening in slits and closing again when the older man presses a kiss against his forehead.

An hour later, Harper and Cullen find them and creep in to join, harboring piles of blankets and pillows. As Harper lays down she reaches out and grabs Tim’s hand, absentmindedly pulling out her phone. Cullen curls up above their heads and falls back to sleep without a word.

Alfred brings breakfast. Sets it up in the corner and then sits down in a neat criss-cross to complete the morning crossword. Damian, who enters roughly fifteen minutes later, sits down and joins him with a sketch pad, scowl clear on his face but otherwise uncomplaining.

Cass creeps in with Barbera behind her, and she reaches out to brush Tim’s hair out of his face and kiss his brow before pulling away again, smiling at Steph and then plopping down on top of Dick, who lets out a quiet  _ ooph  _ but otherwise let it slide. Barbera laughs, softly, gently, maneuvers her chair in the corner and takes out her laptop, the quiet clacking of keys filling the silence.

But then Duke brings his laptop and a collection of disney films, and they set up screen so they can all look at it while still laying down. Jason, when he eventually stomps in, kicks off his boots and is immediately invested.

Bruce is the last to enter. He takes one look at his gathered family, all crammed together in a too-small room, and sighs, utterly unsurprised by the turn of events. He sits down behind Tim’s outstretched feet, reaches out to smooth his thumb over Tim’s ankle, a quiet repetitive pattern of  _ I’m here, I’m here, I’m here. _

None of them say much. They don’t talk about what happened, or what will happen in the future. It’s silent, their message, as they cuddle and laugh and gather close, but it is clear.

_ We are not afraid,  _ they call without saying,  _ and you are not a monster. And you are not alone.  _

_ You are loved,  _ they are all saying, quietly, assuredly, and here and here and here.  _ You are so loved.  _

And Tim breathes it in and lets it sink deep. He breathes it in and lets it buoy him up. He breathes it in.

He  _ breathes. _

And it is not nothing.


	10. and we'll get a chinese and watch tv

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/10/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Chinese - Lilly Allen*
> 
> PROMPT: It would be nice if you wrote something with Roy and Jason, because I love your writing and I think they could have a good relationship but RHATO didn't do it right. (KrazySuperGirl)
> 
> WARNINGS: For *past* drug addiction references and allusions to financial struggles
> 
> This apparently didn't post right the first time so were trying this again...

"I can do it."

"Uhuh."

"No, really, I can do it!"

"Prove it."

Lian's eyes narrow, small hands gripping the five remaining pieces of track from her train set. In front of them lays their built up kingdom, a massive sprawl of wood and bridges and tunnels, all interconnected and winding back and forth.

All of it, that is, except for a break in the track by Jason's big toe. It's too wide a space to be covered by five curving pieces, but Lian is  _ insistent. _

"What do I get out of it? If I make it work?"

It's Jason's turn for his eyes to narrow. He points his yogurt spoon at her dramatically, just to see her nose crinkle in amusement.

(They were technically not supposed to have yogurt, but Jason is only a man, and Lian's puppy dog eyes could put even Dick's to shame.)

"You," he says, "are a little lady after my own heart. How about this: if you succeed in connecting the two ends of the track together,  _ I _ will go about making sure we have cheese toasties for dinner tonight."

"With curly fries?"

"With curly fries."

"Deal."

They shake on it, and the five year old is immediately up and at 'em, considering the track from various angles and trying to fit the pieces together in ways that will work. As Jason suspected, the space is just too wide to cover with what is left over.

He smirks, victorious, only for his smugness to fade quickly when the little girl starts pulling apart another section of the track.

"Hey," he says, "hey, what are you doing-"

Lian smirks, and Jason is reminded, vividly, that this girl's mother is Cheshire.

"You never said I had to use those specific pieces!”

“I take it all back. You are most definitely your father’s child.”

“Shh- Curly fries. You  _ promised.” _

He keeps his eyes narrowed and his finger pointed, even as he stands up and starts heading to the kitchen.

“You are  _ evil,  _ you little gremlin child.  _ Evil.” _

Lian isn’t listening, already working on putting back together her broken train track.

“But you can’t help but love me, I know, I know.”

The bark that escapes his throat is loud in the small crummy apartment, makes the little girl at his feet shoot him a curious look. Jason waves her off, walks into the kitchen and starts pulling out the bread and cheese, messing with finicky controls in order to get the oven preheated.

And then there’s a click.

Jason tenses, whirling around, cheese grater raised like a weapon. 

(In his hands, it most definitely  _ is  _ one.)

But it’s only Roy, swinging the door open wide and shooting him a tired smile. Like a magical dad-sensing magnet, Lian bursts into the room, and everything in the older man’s arms drops to the floor in favour of hugging his daughter.

“ _ Heeeey _ kiddo, how’re you doing? Did you have fun with Uncle Jay? Keep him out of trouble?”

She nods solemnly.

“It was  _ exhausting,  _ but I managed.”

Jason turns his accusing hand on Roy.

“No five year old should have such a developed sense of sarcasm. And I.  _ Blame. You.” _

Roy smushes Lian’s face against his own and puts on his most innocent smile, the younger girl squirming in complaint.

“Who? Me? I’d  _ never.” _

“You are literally proving my point.”

“I have no clue what you’re talking about, but on a completely unrelated note I’ll have you know it’s rude to insult a man in his own home-”

Lian finally squirms free from her father, kicking him in the shins to form an escape route and then wriggling her way up onto his back. She watches the banter flip to and fro like a particularly engaging tennis match, rocking her entire body back and forth and forcing Roy to compensate with his own weight.

It makes the whole conversation have the overall impression of occuring on a teeter saw. However, Jason is a man of many talents, and more than used to it, so he contributes his snark without comment and continues making his toasties.

At least, he does until Roy notices.

“Wait- what are you doing?”

“Ask the squirt.”

The squirt in question is currently hanging upside down from Roy’s bicep.

“Lian, what is he doing?”

“Making me cheese toasties and curly fries because I beat him in a bet.”

The red-head’s eyes narrow in on his daughter.

“Did you use the method we’ve been talking about?”

“I used the loophole!”

_ “Fantastic.” _

“I’ll show you, c’mon, look at our train track-”

Jason slips the sandwiches and fries into the oven, calling over his shoulder about traitor friends and their gremlin daughters, knowing his comments will be purposely ignored in favour of Lian’s excited recounts of the day.

And so it goes. They eat dinner, they banter, they catch up on Phineas and Ferb cartoons and then get Lian ready for bed. She insists on stories being read to her, and then a song sung, and then-

And then she’s finally settled in to sleep.

They slip out of the room together, Jason feeling tired after a long day of chasing after an energetic kid. 

But Roy’s slumped into the lumpy couch with that particular curve of shoulders that Jason knows all too well, and he’s got enough energy left for  _ this.  _

“So,” he asks, as casually as he can manage, “How’d it go today?”

The older man sighs.

“Fine, I guess. Long. Thanks for covering Lian last minute. Again.”

Jason simply hums.

“No problem. You’d do the same for me.”

The laughter that escapes Roy’s throat is cracked but humoured. The T.V. is on, still, Candace about to make her big reveal of nothingness and find herself once more bereft and alone.

“A bunch of little mini Jasons? Can you imagine? The world would be blown up by dawn.”

“I’d protest, but I’m honest enough about myself to realize I could and would mould any offspring to be perfect little minions. You know what else I’d train them in?”

“What?”

“In being as good detectors of deflecting as I am.”

Besides him, Roy tenses. Curls into himself and runs a hand through his bedraggled hair. He looks tired. He looks painfully, painfully young.

Jason wants to reach out. He wants to comfort. But that will always be more Dick’s thing than his own, and so instead he focuses on being as blunt as possible.

“Roy,” he repeats, “ _ How’d it go today?” _

And the redhead- deflates. He sighs and he deflates and he responds, quietly, downputtedly, “Customer service work is  _ the bane of my existence.  _ I got spilled on three separate times by three separate people. And Walmart decided to shut down all its Self Check Out counters so I had to interact with even  _ more  _ people than usual. _ ” _

“And the job search?”

Advertisements start to play and Jason switches channels, finding Scooby Doo reruns and keeping his eye on the screen instead of his young friend’s lined face. He knows all too well how hard looking people in the eye can be when you feel at your lowest.

Roy sinks into the couch even further. 

“Not very well, I don’t think. The interviews all kind of sucked, and if any of them found out I used to be an addict I was basically immediately shown to the door. And…” his dark eyes land on the quickly growing stack of letters piling up by his door, “and bills are adding up. Lian’s getting off school next week which means I’m going to have to work less hours and that means I need a higher paying job to make up for it, but none of those seem to ever be available and-”

Roy swallows, swallows. In the other room, Lian sleeps on, oblivious of the turmoil her father goes through just the other side of a thin wall between them. 

Funny, how that works. How tiny barriers keep the world from looking in on all your shattered parts.

“Jesus, Jay, I’m supposed to take care of her. How can I call myself a good dad when I can’t even keep a stable roof over her head?”

Jason inhales roughly, looking at his despairing friend besides him. He’s not  _ good  _ at this. He’s not good at making things better than they are and seeing possible bright sides. His entire life has been one terrible event after another, and who is he to say that life is anything but an uncaring void that will just as easily pull you into an embrace as it will tear you apart?

No one. He’s  _ no one. _

But Jason is also a fighter. He’s angry and he’s terrible and life has pushed him down a thousand times and he has always gotten back up. He makes things  _ work,  _ again and again, no matter how many times he fails, and one thing that has always been his conviction is that good people deserve to be protected from bad things.

And Roy, who made mistakes and pulled himself out of the gutter with his own two hands, who loves his kid like she’s sunshine and lucky pennies, who lives despite his whole life being one tragedy after another, who is  _ his friend, _ is  _ good.  _

And he deserves to be protected from bad things.

So Jason swallows. Hard.

“You could always-”

_ “I’m not going to Oliver.” _

“I... wasn’t going to suggest that.”

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

They fall into silence. 

(There are old hurts that dreg up, in moments like this, these two lost boys trying to find their way after being thrown so far off the beaten path, trying to find _ themselves  _ in a world that is not kind and does not care.)

Jason pushes on. He makes it work.

“What I was going to say was, well, maybe you and Lian could hang out in the manor. Over the break. Just while you get back on your feet. Gotham is better than Star for employment opportunities, and hazard pay is  _ ridiculous,  _ there’ll be plenty of babysitters present, and you  _ know _ that there’s more than enough room for the both of you…”

He swallows.

“And I could hang out at the manor, too, make sure you guys get settled in okay and that Bruce’s empty nest syndrome doesn’t act up and make him try to adopt Lian for his own.”

“Didn’t he just take in Harper and Cullen a few months ago?”

“Exactly. It’s been too long. The urges are probably already rising up again.”

Roy laughs, tilts his head back and closes his eyes. On screen, the Scooby Doo gang celebrates a job well done.

They fall into silence. 

Sometimes, silence is not such a bad thing.

And then-

“I’ll consider it. Thank you, Jay. Really. It means a lot.”

Jason thinks of pit-madness thrumming under his veins and angered rampages that destroyed books and lamps and dishware. He thinks of quiet late-night sharings and soft comfortable silence and loud boisterous laughter.He thinks of Roy, his friend, who was with him through the worst of things and kept him together even when he was falling apart.

He says, “It’s nothing. I’m just paying it forward.”

And he is.


	11. my words will be your light (to carry you to me)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 11/1/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Winter Song, Sarah Bareilles and Ingrid Michaelson. Originally written by Ronan Keating.*  
> \--> I'm actually really proud of this song pick. It really works with this chapter.
> 
> PROMPT: Is it possible to make another Dragon story because the last one was absolutely beautiful. Maybe one explaining how Bruce adopted all the other children. W/ Cassandra (Anomynous567)
> 
> Warnings: Extreme winter conditions and the dangers assorted with him, harm to children/past child abuse, and thoughts about death.
> 
> THIS CHAPTER IS A CONTINUATION OF A ONE SHOT FROM MY MARCH MADNESS CHALLENGE. The chapter is titled "i'll believe when the walls stop turning (i'll believe when the storm is through)". You don't have to read that one to understand this one, but it might help! Here's the link:
> 
> https://archiveofourown.org/works/17969192/chapters/42741449

Cass does not move.

She stands. Still. Aching. There are cuts on her arms and they drip, bleeding and terrible and human. Her armour has fallen apart, torn from sharp claws and ragged ground.

Inside her chest, it feels like her heart has fallen apart, too. Tiny little beating thing, but every pounding note feels sharpened, wedged in her throat. 

But she is alive. She is  _ alive.  _ Another day has passed and she has proven herself worthy of entering the next one. A purpose served. An evil vanquished. 

Supposedly. 

David Cain’s body moves around her foe. His eyes say  _ proud,  _ his eyes say,  _ greed.  _ There is a certainty to his step. He is confidant, here. 

He turns her back towards her. It says,  _ I am not afraid of you. You are small and loyal and under my power. I am not afraid. _

Cass does not move. But she thinks without words- she  _ thinks- _

_ I have killed greater beings than you. _

And isn’t that a terrifying thought?

But Cain does not see this, in her eyes. This lone, terrible thought that has been building inside of her, a niggling truth woven like a bird’s nest, bit by bit by bit. He is still sure of her blind obedience.

But Cass is not.

_ Cass is not.  _

The man nods to himself, bows down and places his favoured charmed amulet upon the cooling corpse. It begins to glow as the enormous creature begins to hollow out, ancient magics swallowed by greedy stone.

She does not move. She watches. She looks the beast right in the eye: it used to be so full of life.

It is no longer.

No words, no words, but she thinks-  _ I did that.  _

And her heart feels shattered in her chest.

_ Dragon _ , she thinks. And this is one word she knows. One of the few. These powerful creatures who walk the earth like legends, like gods. Their footsteps are supposed to make the ground shake. Their roars are supposed to make the sky crack open. There is something ancient and terrible in their chests and the world of man cannot go on while these monsters dominate.

Supposedly.

But they were also supposed to be unthinking. They were supposed to be animals. They were supposed to be nothing more than slabs of flesh and blood and bone, wrung together by survival, no heart or soul or spirit. No thoughts. No words.

(Just like her.)

And yet-

This dragon- this dragon did not shake the walls of his taverned home as he approached her, fat and lazy and curious. He did not respond as an animal would: he did not scurry away from a human presence. 

He did not respond as an animal would: thoughtless. And Cass had stood there and the tilt of that great head had said  _ curious  _ and the slant of those liquid eyes had said  _ worried, be gentle, be careful. _

The croon, soft and questioning, had said _ just a cub- _

There had been something there, when he was looking at her. Something great and grand and brilliant. Something  _ alive.  _ There was a universe pulling itself together in that massive scaled chest, and it was talking to her in a thousand little movements. It said,  _ I am here, I am here.  _

  1. _Am. Here._



It was beautiful. 

And then, later,  _ later,  _ when Cass was breathing hard and her hands were covered in heated blood that mingled with her own, those eyes had said  _ why, why why- why are you hurting me, why are you doing this, how are you doing this, why why why- _

And now they say nothing at all. Lifeless and dull. Stars winking out of existence, black holes collapsing unto themselves.

Ugly.

Cass stays absolutely still. Like those eyes. Like the dragon at her feet, a hundred times her size and still not fully grown. He will never get any larger.

_ You are gone,  _ she thinks with no words,  _ and I have made you so. Your body lies at my feet and yet you are gone, gone, gone- _

Bodies do not speak when they are still, like this. They do not yell the truths of an individual’s universe.

She tries to replicate it: Cass does not want to be heard.

These tiny little thoughts. They build in her chest, as if she has a universe growing there of her very own. There is something hurting, too, in her heart. It is shattered and displaced and she doesn't like it. She does not know what to do.

The man who raised her told her three simple truths:

_ Dragons are monsters. _

_ Killing them means nothing.  _

_ He is always,  _ _ always _ _ to be obeyed. _

But she stands there, heart too loud in her ears, and she looks, and she does not shake. Something is building inside of her, something terrible and real, and she thinks, she thinks with no words-

_ This dragon was not a monster. _

_ He is gone and I made it so and it aches.  _

_ This is not nothing. _

Little thoughts, little thoughts, thrumming in her chest. She has seen a bird build its nest exactly once, the layers upon layers of hard work. She had been lying in wait for the dragon at her feet. It had been a way to pass the time.

She thinks- 

If two truths were wrong, were broken, were  _ lies,  _ then what is to say that the last truth cannot hold falsehood as well?

(He is still sure of her blind obedience.)

( _ Cass is not.) _

Cain finishes absorbing the magic, smiles smugly to himself. Ra Al Ghul will be pleased: the Weapon worked perfectly, and with the magic of a nearly grown wyvern to boot? The Head of the Demon will be most,  _ most  _ pleased.

Eternal life, after all, comes at a cost.

Ancient magic running through hollow bones. Dragons live for millenia, and they are willing to share with only a select chosen few.

But there are other ways of harvesting magic. Crueler ways, _ monstrous  _ ways, even if its effects are not as potent as when it is freely given.

Cain does not mind. It keeps him in business, after all: dragon slayers are of short supply and he is, of course, the best.

He leaves. His hasty feet say  _ hurry.  _ His upturned chin says  _ successful.  _ His gripped knuckles say  _ follow.  _ He does not look at her. He does not see the danger breathing under her skin.

But Cass is watching, and she can see the weaknesses hiding under his own.

  
  


She leaves him. She leaves him, in the dead of night. Creeps out from the caverns of her childhood and into the washed out moonlight.

It is easy.

(She thought it would be harder. But she also thinks that she broke most of the chains holding her to this place the moment she decided that David Cain held no absolute power.)

The moon is this big growing beacon. She has no plans. No money. Nowhere to go. She only knows that she refuses to hold the shattered remnants of someone else’s universe in her hands. She refuses to make the stars go out.

That is not a refusal that can happen here, in this place of no words and heavy darkness and chains you cannot touch. If she wants the galaxy in her own chest to have a chance to grow, this tender brilliant thing she has only just recognized within herself, then she must leave.

There is a choice to be made. A choice to leave.

She makes it.

She follows the moon, and then the sun, West and West and West. There is a horizon out there, and all the celestial bodies above her are chasing it, so she will chase it too.

She moves on silent feet. Heels first, toes after, a curve of a foot arching to the ground. 

She’s looking for something, she thinks. 

She is not sure what.

She does what she has to in order to survive. She plucks berries from sharp bushes and steals portions of meals from those who can afford it. She sneaks into towns and falls asleep in abandoned buildings and unused attics. She watches as the world moves on all around her, the way people laugh and fight and come together in the worst of times. All these little universes, endless and brilliant and contained in a single person’s chest.

Miraculous. Brilliant. So very different from the things she has always known

Life is more complicated than three singular truths. She is learning that, now. A world full of clashing supernovas and roving meteor belts, of planets and gas giants and distant milky ways. There is no way to encapsulate it all, not with a thousand truths, a thousand novels, a thousand lifetimes. 

There is no way, and yet here she is, breathing out solar flares and breathing in shooting stars. 

Here she is,  _ breathing. _

On her worst nights, she curls up small and cold and tries to imagine a sun emblazoned in her chest. On her worst nights, she weeps, thinking of a universe she held in her hands and crushed into nothing. She stays still, because bodies that do not move do not speak, and she is afraid of being heard. 

And even then the sun still rises to chase it’s next horizon, and she follows.

Even then, she is still living 

Cass stumbles upon the scene on accident.

She is walking the earth, searching for something to eat, and she finds it.

Footprints.

No-

_ Hidden footprints.  _

Someone does not want to be seen, here. Someone does not want to be found.

Usually, she would let them stay lost. She knows how it feels to cup your hands over your chest as if to stop the sunlight from spilling through. She knows how it feels to fear your universe being found and vanquished.

But-

But she knows these hidden tracks. These hidden markers. She knows the step of a man on the prowl. She knows just what this hunter is hunting. 

After all, after all, she has hunted them herself.

_ Dragons.  _

She stands, frozen. Hardly daring to breathe.

There is a choice, here. There is always, always a choice.

But Cass made her choice the moment she told herself without words  _ never again. _

She breathes, turns away from the sun, and follows the hidden footprints pressed into the earth.

There is a man at her feet and blood on her hands, and it mingles with her own. 

She is not tired, but she’s breathing hard, shakily. There is a universe spiraling at her feet and a universe blazing in her chest and a massive, expansive dragon at her back, larger than any she has ever seen. If the man who raised her told her that this creature was a monster, she might have believed him.

But no, no, she has made _ a choice _ . There is a universe in this dragon’s scaled chest just as much as there is one in her own. She refuses to hold the shattered remnants of someone else’s universe in her hands. She refuses to make the stars go out.

Slowly, she turns.

The dragon looks down on her, blocking the skyline, a shifting mass of scale and muscle. 

The shuffling of his claws says  _ uncertain, cautious, confused, what do I do?  _

The stance of his shoulders says  _ protect, defensive, I have fought and wounded and I am prepared to fight again. _

His liquid eyes are a deep, deep blue. They look at her, saying  _ do not be afraid, I will not hurt you.  _

Cass breathes, breathes. 

The man at her feet was not her father, but it could have been. Standing by a dragon was not safe, especially  _ this  _ dragon, this towering presence of magic and might. She knows how a dragonslayer thinks, the way this sort of potential power calls to them. She was once one of them.

The large black dragon leans close, slow, and her fingers twitch for a weapon she does not have. But a choice has been made, and so she opens her stance and closes her eyes. Says without words  _ I will not hurt you I am small and alone and not dangerous- _

She feels the beast’s warm breath ruffle her hair.

And then suddenly, suddenly, the dragon is roaring, careening back. He snarls at her, loud in the echoing cavern. It makes her ears ring, makes the ground shake. She stumbles and breathes and rolls with it, finding her balance in the midst of shifting stone. 

There are some things that leave traces on you for all of your days.

Killing a dragon is one of them.

_ (Eternal life, after all, comes at a cost-) _

The creature’s eyes flash.  _ Betrayal,  _ his entire body throws at her, a thousand messages with every single part of itself,  _ kinslayer, monster- _

And Cass does not know how to say that she is more than just the monster, that there is a universe inside of her chest and that she made  _ a choice _ -

She doesn't know how to say  _ His body was at my feet and yet he was gone, gone, gone. I could not know yet what I had wrought _ . Doesn’t know how to say,  _ I have wept a thousand tears for a universe I held in my hands and crushed into nothing. Can you not smell the salt? _

She has no words. She was not taught them-

But dragons do not have words.

_ (Just. Like. Her.) _

So she uses what she has. She speaks with what is available to her. She bends, exposing her neck, curling into herself,  _ I am small,  _ she says,  _ I am small and young and learning still. _

She hopes her eyes speak of her regret. She hopes her trembling hands speak of her guilt.

She breathes and feels her heart pound. 

_ There is a universe in my chest- can you hear it? Can you hear it? _

The dragon  _ roars,  _ and it is so very loud. It cracks the sky open. 

She may die here. It would be a death justly served.

But she thinks she would prefer following the sun to its endless horizon, wherever it might be. She thinks she would prefer living, if only for a while more. There is so much yet she has not seen, so many galaxies still untouched.

She breathes.

And the dragon-

The dragon flies away. 

Cass breathes.

In, and out, and in again. How strange, breathing is, when she focuses on it. How strange is it to breathe. 

There is a cost, and she did not pay it. 

She is living still.

She swallows, shaking, aching. There is a man at her feet and his universe is spiraling away, so she hauls him onto her shoulders and carries him mechanically to the village healer some miles to the North. She does not notice her own pains and aches until the elderly physician expresses concern. 

But she has no money, and she can pay for no care, and so she leaves.

The winter creeps in, after that, and she travels through it numbly. She carves out shelters for herself in the snow and steals a spare coat and boots from a passing caravan. 

She is still so cold. Her injuries, slowly healing, make it hard to travel and harder to hunt. 

She marches on. 

There is a sun setting on the horizon. _If you make it there,_ she thinks, _there will be warmth._ _If you make it there, you will find what you are looking for._

She still does not know what that is, but if it is good enough for the celestial beings to chase after than it is good enough for her. So she follows on silent feet and hopes she has proven herself enough to face another tomorrow.

But her feet are growing tired, and she is so very cold.

Sometimes, out of the corner of her eye, Cass thinks she is not alone. There are shadows where shadows should not be and voids where everything should take up space. Sometimes, she thinks it is the cost, come to collect the debt of the shattered universe in her hands by taking her own.

But when she turns around, there is no one there.

She marches on with tired, silent feet. The world grows colder. And people do not want to help this strange girl with her broken tongue and haunted eyes.

But she is not helpless. She is not unable to help.

(She comes across them, sometimes, other weary travellers of the road. She offers what she has, scraps of sustenance and drawn maps to the closest town. They offer her words in thanks and she takes them, practicing the stumbling phrases even though she was never taught.)

Onwards and onwards she goes, numb and fighting and human. She loses feeling in her fingers and then in her toes. Her eyelashes freeze across her face. She imagines a sun emblazoned in her chest and curls around it, seeking the warmth.

But even the brightest stars must die out. And eventually, eventually, she finds a patch of frozen grass in a forest and lies down.

She is so cold. Too cold. There is a cost she must pay for what she has done and she supposes this is how she must pay it, with her universe seeping out of every extremity along with her warmth and all her life yet lived.

And yet, and yet- Cass has chased sunsets and watched a thousand galaxies unite. She has come so far from those dark caverns of no words and heavy darkness and chains you cannot touch. She has breathed free air, if only for a little while. She has had  _ a life worth living _ , if only in these few, small hours.

So she thinks- in her few, precious words-  _ A little life is enough. _

She keeps her eyes open for as long as she can. She watches glimpses of stars move through the clouds. She watches the snow, how it floats down from the heavens and joins the mere mortals on earth. She wonders what it is, to fly like that. She wonders what it is, to have so many friends, all fluttering around you and gathering close.

She wonders, because it distracts her from thinking about how the sun will have to journey on tomorrow without her.

She hopes it will not be lonely. She hopes that it will find that horizon it so sought, that it knows what it is looking for. Perhaps, when it reaches wherever it is going, it will think of her.

She hopes.

And eventually, eventually, her eyes close.

Time passes in a dream, a cold dream. A lonely one.

The snowflakes fall. She feels them, distantly, landing on her skin. 

And then- suddenly-

It stops. It all stops. And she is gathered up, pulled close. It is warm, so suddenly, and she curls into it. It has been so long since she has been warm-

_ The cost,  _ she thinks,  _ there is a cost for the shattered universe I held in my hands and now it has come to collect- _

She breathes. Somewhere above her there is a deep rumble, so deep it could have been pulled from the very earth.

_ Safe,  _ it says with no words,  _ You are safe.  _

And Cass has never been safe all her life, but she thinks she might believe it.

She wakes up, eventually, to a sky full of sunshine.

She blinks, blinks-

A familiar rumbling above her, and suddenly the sky is blotted out. A massive liquid eye moves close, scaled snout sniffing her smaller frame, nudging gently at her stomach and shoulders. 

Cass stays perfectly still, because bodies that do not move do not speak, and she is lost for words of any kind.

“Bruce,” someone calls,  _ “Bruce,  _ c’mon ya big lug, move out of the way. You’re  _ scaring  _ her.”

_ I am not scared,  _ she wants to say, but she is still and silent.

The dragon snorts. Croons. It turns from her and rises up and up and up. But she can still feel it’s gaze, watching her, waiting for her body to tell of its universe.

A universe she still has: the cost did not take it.

A young woman with red hair replaces the dragon. She smiles, purposely open and relaxed. Her eyes spark with intelligence. Her open palms whisper of kindness.

“Hey,” she says, with words that Cass cannot use, not yet, “Welcome to Wayne Island.”

And this is the start of everything after.

She learns that the woman’s name is Barbara, and that they are not alone. She is enfolded into their numbers without a second glance, and she has never had so many people talk to her ever in her entire existence.

It is overwhelming. And yet…

Dick laughs and tells grand stories of a wider world she still has not had a chance to see. Jason sits patiently besides her as she learns how to fumble scribbled lines into words and sentences and paragraphs. Stephanie smiles, brilliant, and shows her all the best places to go swimming on the island. Tim makes her things, clever little things that she can play with when her mind is rampant and her fingers shake, and he does not judge. Alfred lays foods out on the table, and there is always plenty and she is always invited

Others have struggled with her broken tongue and haunted eyes. They do not know how to communicate with her, this girl of so few words-

But not them. Not this little family of mix-match personalities and backstories and lives. They look at her. They see her. She does not need to be loud in order to be heard.

After all, they live with Bruce, and dragons do not have words of which to speak.

Bruce, who lets her sunbathe on his warm black scales when the cold inside of her tries to swallow her whole. Bruce, who wraps around them late at night and keeps them close and safe and loved. Bruce, who had sensed the broken universe on her hands and brought her here anyways.

Some might call it mercy. Some might call it foolish. 

Cass breathes. She has no words to call it anything, not yet.

But on early mornings she likes to climb the mountains of her new island home in order to greet the sun. The golden light spills over the sea and her entire world becomes a burning horizon of warmth and colour, and she thinks-  _ this is what we were both looking for. _

She is more than a weapon. She is more than a cost to be paid. She is not still, she speaks,  _ she speaks.  _

These tiny little thoughts. They build in her chest, a bird’s nest with layers upon layers of hard work, and her universe grows around them. She is built on her own truths, and each truth is a choice of her very own.

They thrum in her chest, all these things she cannot name. She wants every universe to come together at the touch of her fingertips, so she can watch every sunrise all at once. So that she can count every raindrop that drips out of place. So that she can bring to life every autumn leaf in their glorious colours with a paintbrush all to her own.

So that when the stardust falls, it all falls down on her. A thousand galaxies melding together, one by one by one.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys. It's not just me- right? Like? drAGON SLAYER CASS???? It makes perfect sense for this au. Right?   
> RIGHT!?
> 
> (Please. I need the validation.)
> 
> But also this really wasn't supposed to be so long but dragons make me weak. Whelp. Hope you enjoyed <3


	12. why are there so many songs about rainbows (and what's on the other side?)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/12/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Rainbow Connection, Kermit the Frog*
> 
> Warnings: Messed up assassin childhood, and the trauma that comes with it.
> 
> My body refused to write today so take an old work... :/ Sorry guys.

“Damian! C’mon, we gotta go!”

Damian growls under his breath and turns his music up, cramming himself into the corner of his temporary room. He does not wish to go, and thus he refuses to do it. The whole trip is stupid and pointless, and most definitely because Grayson is a sentimental fool.

However, he would take going on a pointless trip with Grayson a million times over staying home with Drake for the week, and so he has no right to complain. He has made his choices.

This doesn’t stop him from scowling and hiding away from Grayson like a petulant child. ( _ Grayson will not hurt him for this, there is no punishment for this, Damian can do this. It’s alright, it's alright, it's alright…) _

The whole thing starts after Father dies and Grayson decides the easiest thing to do would be to move back to Gotham, as the rundown one bedroom apartment in Bludhaven is no place for two teenage boys and a butler in addition to the young police officer. 

However, that means that he doesn’t need to keep the apartment anymore, and that he has to quit his job at the police station, and that he has to pack up his stuff and, well, move.

And that would have been fine, that would have been totally, completely fine, but Grayson is sentimental and emotional and _ insists _ that he drives down himself to visit everything one last time and to say goodbye to everyone and because Grayson is leaving the Manor, Damian can not be left on his own as he is ‘too young’- which makes no sense, because he’s  _ Robin _ , if he’s old enough to fight crime he’s old enough to stay home alone- so he can either stay with  _ Drake _ or go with Grayson.

He goes with Grayson.

The Police Station Grayson works at is a torture to visit. Grayson introduces him as ‘his little brother’ and most of the officers coo over him and pinch his cheeks despite his scowl and he has to resist the urge to bite them, because this is _humiliating_ they _are too close_ and _letting people close is dangerous, leaves you open for attack, and you have to be careful and-_

And that is before, not now. Damian shifts, breathes.

He keeps his jaw clenched tight.

Those who are not fawning over him are fawning over Grayson, complimenting him for ‘giving up his life’ to take care of his little brothers- a phrase that makes Damian’s stomach crawl- and scolding him for not telling them he was Bruce Wayne’s kid and then hastily backtracking and airly apologizing for the man’s death until even Grayson’s smile seems to fall flat and Damian’s aura becomes so dark the officers around him grow skittish.

In the end, Grayson grabs a couple of boxes of his things and waves goodbye, leaning in and giving the only semi tolerable officer in the building- a woman by the name of Amy Rohrbach- a firm hug, and then they’re leaving and Grayson’s free hand is guiding him out by the shoulder, the door slipping shut behind them.

The next few days are equally as boring and as atrocious, filled with Grayson dealing with mountains of paperwork and a sudden million friendly neighbors who all somehow felt the need to drop by and say hi and confirm that the rumours are true, most of whom the older man had apparently never properly met, much less conversed with.

And this, Damian can deal with. Is is annoying? Yes. Is it bothersome? Yes. Does it make him want to pull out his sword and yell at them all to leave Grayson alone? _ Hell yes _ . But he can deal with it. He can plug in his music and cram his headphones over his ears and hide out in Grayson’s room until the people leave and he and his brother are alone again. He can deal.

But then Grayson just  _ has _ to go and ruin it all by proclaiming that they are out of food and that they have to go _ grocery shopping _ .

Damian knows what grocery shopping is, even though he’s never been. Alfred normally does it once a week, and it involves going out in public and doing things and seeing people, and Damian rallies against all these actions with his very being.

Grayson calls him over dramatic. Damian is not over dramatic; disappearing from things that displease you is a perfectly logical thing to do. 

Which is how he finds himself crammed in his small corner, headphones blasting music and a scowl on his face.

But Grayson has become Batman, and Batman inherently has to be an excellent detective, and Damian is  _ far  _ too quickly found. 

And of course Grayson is wearing the frown of disappointment. The look is not even scolding, but sometimes the older man flashes him the expression and Damian would almost prefer him to shout and be angry, because the frown of disappointment makes his heart clench tight because if there is one thing that Damian despises above all else it is failing to live up to Grayson’s expectations.

And Damian knows how to deal with shouting and anger. Not quiet disappointment. He knows how to deal with “You’re not good enough” from cold hands and blank faces and not, “I love you and I believe in you and I know that if you try a little harder you can do it” from Grayson, who’s very  _ being  _ seems to be encoded to express emotion, who looks at Damian and every facet of his face seems to say  _ I love you I love you I love you... _

It disconcerts him at the best of times.

“C’mon Dami, we won’t be gone very long. And you don’t even have to do much! You can just follow along while I pick up the basics. That’s it, I  _ promise _ .”

Especially times like these.

Grayson’s eyes are widening pleadingly, and Damian curses his inability to look away. Throwing up one last line of defense, he desperately scrambles for an excuse to get him out of the trip.

“People will approach you- will approach  _ us- _ and fawn over me like idiotic baboons to try and get in your good favor. I don’t-  _ like _ letting people that close.”

The admission makes his teeth grit-  _ don’t express weakness, don’t show emotions, emotions get you killed what are you doing- _ and leaves a bad aftertaste in his mouth, but he lets it slip out. He hopes it will be enough to deter Grayson.

It is not.

“I know- I- Look. Dami- it’s… hard. I don’t wanna leave you alone, and we need to get food. Real food. Not takeout. I’ve fed you way too much takeout as it is. Since they’ll be strangers you can tell them to leave you alone, kay?”

Grayson looks tired. His blue eyes have bags under them, and his gaze holds that sort of quiet exhaustion that comes from grief and responsibility and late nights and early work. Damian knows that he’s part of the problem, part of why Grayson’s cracking a little at the edges. He knows he’s not easy. He knows that he repels people like glaciers repel ships, that he breaks everything he touches.

He knows that he’s hard to love. Some would say he’s not worthy of it.

But Grayson loves him. Grayson loves him and loves him and loves him, Grayson is never scared and never cold, and his tired eyes hold so much care and affection despite the exhaustion. Damian says he’s confused and lost and scared in a thousand tiny silent ways that he can’t even name, and Grayson sees them, reaches out, and one by one his steady fingers smooth out Damian’s rough edges, every touch mending the jagged twisted thing in his chest that might someday be heart.

(He breaks everything he touches because he is a broken thing. Maybe one day he will heal enough that Grayson can teach him how to reach back out and smooth out the man’s own edges, until all is right in the world and everything is peace and calm and together. Maybe.)

Grayson tries, tries with an endless patience that Damian could never understand, and some days, _ bad days _ , Damian screams at him because Damian is a monster, a monster,  _ why can’t you see  _ and  _ why don’t you care about that  _ and a thousand questions he can’t quite get his tongue to form.

The point is, Damian knows he is hard to love. Knows that, despite his best intentions, he adds on to the heavy weight on Grayson’s shoulders instead of lifting it, and that sometimes caring means doing things you don’t want to do.

( _ Don’tcareWhyareyoucaringYou’regoingtogetyourselfkilledYou’regoingtoget _ _ him _ _ killed-) _

Damian scowls, shoves his hands in his pockets even though he’s already curled up in a cramped corner and the position is uncomfortable.

“Tt. I reserve the right to bite them.”

“What, Dami-  _ No _ . We’ve _ talked _ about this, you can’t just  _ bite  _ people because they’re annoying!”

He glares, opens his mouth to retort, but Grayson firmly shakes his head.

“Nope. No biting allowed, or I’m taking away your Ipod.” 

There must be something showing on his face-  _ Because the Ipod is his, Grayson has said that Damian’s things were his and that no one was going to take anything without his permission and _ \- because the older man’s expression softens in contrite.

“Not like that, Dami, you would get it back. You’ll always get it back. I promise,” he sighs, closes his eyes, opens them again and says in a sort of pleading voice, “Let’s compromise, okay? How about this: if anyone reaches out to touch you, you can slap their hands away,  _ gently _ . Does that sound fair?”

Damian wishes to fight some more, to growl and frown and protest, but the idea is better than some of the… other compromises that Grayson has come up with, so he nods instead, rolling to his feet.

Still, though, this is against his will, and to show it Damian pulls up his hood and turns his music up so loud that all he can hear is the the thrumming of the drums and guitar and a steady pounding of note after note after note, the sound almost vibrating in his bones.

Grayson grabs some cheap fabric bags from some random box in the kitchen and his keys from the counter, and then they are out the door and roaring down the street on a motorcycle with Damian tucked against Grayson’s back, the rush of air blowing harsh and fast through his hoodie and the music pounding in his ears despite the helmet.

(He will never admit, or perhaps only under threat of death, but he _ likes _ Grayson’s motorcycle. Likes the wind and the speed, likes the excuse to grip tight and close and hold Grayson without anyone questioning. It’s… _ nice.) _

And then they are at the grocery store, and it’s surprisingly  _ huge _ , and Damian shifts uncomfortably on his feet because there  _ are _ a lot of people there, and he looks up at Grayson and _ scowls _ at the older man’s sheepish smile.

“ _ Grayson. _ ”

Despite his stated irritance, all the older man does is sigh and apologize before mildly usher him in the directions of the carts, humming some inane song under his breath.

(Damian’s music is better.)

“C’mon Dami, it’s not  _ too  _ bad.”

It is, in fact, very, very bad. And there are too many people and Damian really just doesn’t particularly like this and he doesn’t _ like _ it when strangers brush past him and touch his shoulders or arms or wrists-  _ Yes,  _ he tells the imaginary Grayson voice in his head,  _ even if it is by accident _ \- and he especially doesn’t like it when strangers have the audacity to ruffle his hair. People don’t get to do that. Only  _ Grayson _ does, and that’s only if he can catch Damian by surprise.

Damian wants to yell at everyone to get out of his way, but he’s not supposed to do that anymore, and it’s apparently rude, and it would also draw attention to himself and Damian doesn’t like it when people stare at him very much either.

(He never has, it’s just that recently he’s realized he’s permitted to express it.)

So instead he hunches into himself and stays close to Grayson, scowling at everyone and everything and suppressing his tiny reactive flinches whenever someone breezes lightly past him, his instincts screaming at him to grab the stray arm and flip the body it was attached to, because far too often with the Ah Guls one light waver in the air is all Damian has to prepare himself for a test, for an assassin, for a fight.

But there are no tests here. Not anymore. Not with Grayson. 

(A voice whispers  _ But what if-) _

_ ( _ Damian ignores it.)

They finally reach the carts, and Grayson is still humming and if he keeps it up Damian is sure that the song will get stuck in his own head. He reaches for his headphones, but then an older man in a trench coat walks briskly past him, his whole side knocking lightly with Damian’s back, and he can do nothing but jerk away from the sudden touch, fingers clenching into a fist and body dropping low into a fighter’s stance on instinct before Damian can control the urges.

The man who bumped him doesn’t even look back, just keeps on walking and talking into his phone.

And then Grayson is in front of him, abandoning his freshly retrieved cart, hands fluttering slightly around his shorter frame before settling on his shoulders.

“You okay?”

Damian nods, because of course he is, the man hardly touched him, but at the same time he really, really, doesn’t like being here, doesn’t like being touched,  _ doesn’t like random, strange not-Grayson men bumping into him, and he’s tense and agitated and _ -

“We can go home, if you want.”

And of course Grayson would offer to go home _ now _ . Of course he would. Because Grayson is nice. Because Grayson is willing to forestall his time and his needs for Damian’s comfort and safety even though Damian probably really, really doesn’t deserve it.

He almost says yes.

Almost.

But they’re already at the store, and going back to the apartment would just make the entire trip a waste of time and utterly pointless and they  _ are _ out of food and it would look weak and stupid and-

And it was just one guy, and Damian has no right to be spooked by it. He’s faced assassins. He’s  _ Robin. _ Some petty man too busy with his phone to look up shouldn’t have Damian running for the hills. He’s _ fine _ .

He’s not a coward. He’s strong.

“Tt. It’s fine, Grayson.”

Grayson doesn’t look like he believes him, because the older man seems to have some built in lie detector when it comes to Damian. One that is often highly annoying when he’s trying to get away with something.

And Grayson’s brows are still furrowed in concern, but then they flit up to the cart besides them and they light up with an idea. Damian watches on cautiously, because sometimes the older man creates excellent plans of action. Other times… not so much.

“You could ride in the cart, if you wanted. No one can brush past you there. And you don’t even have to do anything! Just sit there and listen to your music while I get the essentials. That sound good?”

And Grayson is smiling at him again, eyes bright and happy and purposely wide, his eyebrows wiggling up and down suggestively and-

He looks like and idiot. An idiot. A stupid, stupid, idiot man who cares too much about everyone and everything, even Damian, and- 

And-

And Damian wants to laugh, feels the tickle up in his throat and the upward quirks of his lips, because the man truly looks ridiculous, but- but- laughing was never tolerated, before, back when Damian wasn’t just Damian but Damian Al Ghul, an assassin. A thing of killing and death and blood red hands.

Maybe Damian is still a thing. But Grayson never sees him like that. So probably not. 

Probably.

So he quenches the laughter and shoves a hand in the man’s face, grumbling, pulls his hood up and busies himself with adjusting his headphones over his ears to hide his smile.

“Soooooo… What d’ya say?”

Damian shrugs, eyeing the cart suspiciously. The space is not too big- he’d probably have to scrunch up a bit- and the metal railings probably wouldn’t be too terribly comfortable to sit on. However, the sides were high and it would provide an ample barrier…

But- but is such an act allowed? Would it be seen as childish? Would it attract _ stares _ ?

He stares dubiously at the cart, hesitating.

And then someone brushes past him again ( _ take the wrist, swing it over your back, slam the body to the ground and drive your elbow into the throat- no, no Damian, not anymore, it’s just an idiot girl, an idiot teenage girl, angrily chasing after a younger sibling, not a test, there’s no more tests _ ), and his mind is already made up, and he’s climbing into the cart.

Dick smiles at him-  _ And where is he getting that warmth? How is he so much like the sun? How? _ \- bright and wide, the kind of smile he gets when he’s really happy with him, the one that crinkles the corners of his eyes up and almost makes Damian want to smile, too.

Damian doesn’t though, not beyond a small tiny twitch of the lips, and rolls his eyes instead, turning away slightly and crossing his arms. One doesn’t express emotions when one is an assassin. One should avoid emotions in general when one is an assassin, and if feeling is a must the feelings should be controlled and directed and nothing else.

_ You're not an assassin anymore,  _ some small pathetic part of his brain whispers at him,  _ you don't have to be like that... _

After all, it’s not like that with Grayson. Grayson smiles and laughs and frowns and glares and grins and pouts and shows shows shows, like his entire life is a performance of his emotions, as if his body is a canvas and his feelings the paint. Grayson draws and scribbles and strokes with the colours of his expression to the point that Damian sometimes doubts he even knows how to stop, and that sometimes makes his heart freeze in his chest because  _ NO, no Grayson you can’t care, you can’t, caring gets you killed- you can’t, you can’t die and leave me alone- _

But that just washes him over with the realization that he cares about Grayson again and again and again, that he can’t stop caring about the man no matter how hard he tries, and that makes fear run rampant in his veins because _ caring gets you killed and- _

So Damian tries to keep his canvas blank. That way, if he messes up, he can just blame Grayson and his utter ridiculousness.

(Something in him pushes- pushes and sometimes wins, now- and it’s the voice that says that caring isn’t bad, the voice that says caring is okay.)

(The voice sounds like Grayson.)

“Are you gonna get in?”

Damian gets in.

It’s odd, the motion of being moved without any control of where he is going and he grasps the sides of the cart with a white knuckled grip. But then he settles himself, tells himself that it was just like a car or a plane or even Grayson’s motorbike, and carefully, slowly relaxes. It’s not like before, it’s not like before. It’s not. Grayson is not a random face that Damian does not know, one that could be an assassin or a murderer or someone intent on driving the vehicle to his doom. Grayson is Grayson, and Damian can trust him.

He can.

They are Batman and Robin. They trust each other. Batman and Robin don’t hurt each other. They don’t.

And so they muddle their way along through to the store, and people pass by and no one touches Damian, and he can just cram into the corners of the slightly too-small cart and watch the world go by, messing with his phone, music pounding in his ears and Grayson humming and hawing over what cereal to buy, and it is… nice.

They get stopped, of course. Grayson’s face has been splattered across every news channel the last few weeks or so non stop. Of course they get recognized. But Damian avoids it by curling up ever so slightly and tugging down the hood of his jacket, turning the volume up on his Ipod and pretending he doesn’t notice his surroundings.

(It’s a lie. Damian always notices his surroundings.  _ Just in case.) _

Grayson makes the point of taking several steps away from the cart whenever someone randomly pops up by his side, distancing himself from Damian and preventing him from being dragged into yet another uncomfortable conversation. It’s nice.

(Grayson is nice. Being with Grayson is nice. This is nice. Nice, nice, nice. It’s a word that Damian used to be unable to grasp and now seems to be his go too word for description. It’s weird and it’s… nice.)

Eventually, everyone who wants to chat with the new famous person has chatted, and they are left alone.

Slowly, the cart begins to fill up. Grayson trundles to different sections of the store, mingles in an aisle for an hour or so- or, at least, it feels like it- before carefully picking out one or two items and dropping them alongside Damian. It’s stupid, of course, because Grayson is now officially a billionaire, but the older man does it all the same, meandering from lane to lane and humming softly under his breath as he does so, that same old song from before.

Damian keeps his headphones, holding his phone out and playing a game as he does so, but the sound has long since been muted. He’s listening, listening to Grayson as he hums and putters around the store, to the slight creakings of the shopping cart beneath him, to the other customers chatting in the background, to the lousy music playing softly from overhead, but mostly just to Grayson. The quiet song is... nice, too. Comforting, even, if Damian is truly honest with himself, which he very rarely is.

It’s good. Almost normal. And the feeling seeps into Damian’s bones. If all grocery shopping trips are like this, then perhaps he won’t mind coming so much next time, although he will still have to put up some heavy protests.

Because barriers. Barriers are the key. Barriers keep Damian safe when he’s confused and Dick has told him,  _ he has told him, _ that Damian can take all the time he needs to be comfortable, and Damian will test those bonds of patience and promise until he is satisfied they will hold or until they break, because Damian is careful, always careful, and he doesn’t dare to let his guard fall until he is absolutely, positively sure.

And it’s moments like this that make Damian think that maybe he is sure-  _ because Grayson is Grayson and Damian has trusted him and depended on him and cared for him, because Grayson is Grayson, and Damian has only had him for a little while but he can’t quite picture his life without him anymore anyways, as terrifying a thought as that might be- _ and that he’s just waiting because he is scared of change.

That maybe he is always scared, and always will be.

But he listens to softly hummed tunes of songs he doesn’t know the words of, and all the while the piles of groceries slowly build up around him. It's dawning realization that he is not afraid, here, in these tired moments of mundane truths and acts of humanity. That he is not afraid here, with Grayson by his side.

He breathes.

There are nightmares in his chest and convictions laid out in his bones. He was born into them, and his small body grew around them because it had too.

But here he is, breathing, breathing. Damian is more than a killer, more than something to be molded. He is a brother, and a hero, and a boy who likes good music and animals and a mission well done. Damian is more than what he was raised to be.

He is human.

And curled up in an uncomfortable metal cart, canned goods and cereal boxes stacking up around him, Grayson sending him a soft smile when he catches his eye-

Human isn’t such a bad thing to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Dick was totally singing Rainbow Connection, just so you all know <3


	13. when the world becomes a fantasy (and you're more than you could ever be)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/13/2020
> 
> Chapter Title From Come Alive, The Greatest Showman
> 
> PROMPT: If you’re looking for prompts, I think a fantasy-setting could be really interesting :) (annalikespandas)

There is a castle, up on a mountain not so far away, that they say is haunted.

An ancient place, this castle is, there longer than anyone has ever known. From the beginning of time, if you believe the elders, and the youth laughs and jeers and trades uneasy glances.

Once, say the elders, there was a young prince who lived up there with his mother and father, who loved him dearly. But a monster came and ate them up, and the boy was all alone forever. So haunted was he by the loss of his parents, he sold his soul to the devil and the darkness swallowed him up.

There is a castle, up on a mountain and not so far away, and they say that it is haunted by a man shrouded in black, shadows crawling up his shoulders like a cape, eyes made out of nightmares and turmoil. A lonely prince turned monster who comes out of his crumbling home in the dark of night and takes children from their beds when they don’t appreciate their parents enough and forget to do as they’re told.

All fairytales, of course. Tall talk. No one believes it.

Except- 

Sometimes people go searching, usually tall and brash young men with the sense for an adventure and the jeer for a silly scare. Confident boys who spy on tall blackened walls and laugh mockingly, knock shoulders with their friends, and enter. 

Because obviously there’s nothing to fear. 

Obviously.

Except- 

They never come out the same, those brash young boys. They appear at the edge of the forest surrounding the village, right at the brink of dawn, and they are terrified of the shadows and their dreams are full of nightmares-

And then the next day they wake up with no memory of what happens, only a niggling fear of the haunted castle on it’s lonely mountain peaks.

* * *

“Another one, sir?”

Bruce sighs, the shadowy tendrils of his true form slowly crawling back and slithering under his skin. His eyes fading from their jarring red and cooling into a dark brown.

“I’m afraid so, Alfred. These ones didn’t even know how to hold a sword properly. _Gods,_ what are they teaching kids in this century?”

“I suppose you’d know more, sir, if you left the castle every once in a while.”

“Shush, Alfred, you know I don’t do that anymore. Not since-”

Silence. Not all humans who came to the castle have been the young and brash and easily frightened.

Not all monsters had claws and teeth and magic.

“Shall I bring them back to the village then, Master Bruce?”

“Yes, thank you- yes. And please, feel free to swallow their memories, I’m sure they’d be thankful for it.”

“You are most welcome, sir.”

* * *

There is a circus that travels through, sometimes, loud and boisterous and like nothing the sleepy little village of Gotham usually gets to see. It’s crowded with strange and wondrous sights: snakes with two heads, supposed unicorns and hippogriffs. Magic, if you will.

But of the snake with two heads, only one of them moves. And the horn on the unicorn flops if it shifts too much. And the griffin is too skinny to be impressive, especially with all it’s magled eagle feathers constantly falling off.

Fake, of course. The whole lot of them. Fantasy creatures, after all, do not exist. It’s just something to bring in the crowd, and illusion for the eye to feast upon, a con man doing his job and getting paid for it. 

Most visit Zucco’s Circus for the laughs. The entertainment is picking out the tricks.

However, there is one act that sticks out.

There is a circus that travels through, and this time in it is a boy with brilliant cobalt wings protruding from his back. He flies, this boy, bursts into the air with a flash of silver and white, loops around the audience and performs impossible acrobatics up in the air. 

He’s kept in a cage like one of the animals, and he does not speak, simply offering forced smiles as people go by. But the carnival goers all assume it’s part of the show. After all, a flying boy can’t be _real-_

Except-

On the last night the circus stays in Gotham, a figure walks out of the shadows at the woods and sits in the audience.

The next day, the circus burns to the ground, or so they say. No one really remembers it. But there is a rumour that someone saw the flying boy burst through the top of the collapsing tent, wings aglow in the moonlight, and zoom over the forest, a carefree laugh echoing in the silence.

A rumour, obviously. A wives tale.

The ringmaster is never seen again.

* * *

“Hello.”

The boy looks up, shoulders hunching and those massive wings curling closer to his skinny frame. He was smiling, earlier, when that _bastard_ ringmaster Tony Zucco had been watching closely, but now the man was gone and the forced smile with it. He doesn’t say anything, just watches Bruce with weary blue eyes, dirty fingers curling around his knees.

But Bruce knows that look. Knows that haunting ache resting in those watery blues. He’s seen it in the mirror.

“My name is Bruce,” he says, for lack of anything better, and then he swallows dry, “and I’m just like you.”

The kid jerks, gaze fluttering to the empty space behind the man’s shoulder’s blades and then back to his face, disbelieving.

“Not like that. Here, let me show you-”

And gently, carefully, a shadowy tendrill creeps out from beneath his cloak and in between the bars, sneaking it’s way towards the child sitting in it’s center. 

There is a monster in Bruce’s chest that is so _angry_ seeing the boy like this, crammed up small to make room for his wings, and even then the tops of the folded appendages brush against the ceiling of the cage.

It makes him angry to see the boy in a cage at all.

But he breathes. Lets it go. Now is not the time.

The kid reaches out, brushes his small fingers against the shadow, watches how it startles back and then scuttles forward, onto his knee.

And he-

Giggles.

It’s the softest, sweetest sound Bruce has ever heard. 

He swallows dry. 

He can’t leave this child here. He _won’t_ leave this child here.

So he leans in close and whispers, quietly, determinedly-

“I’m going to get you out of here. Tonight.”

And he does. That night, Bruce’s true form runs rampant, a twenty foot monster of shadowy darkness and death. He disintegrates the entire circus into dark ash, roaring and listening to the ringmaster scream. The winged boy dashes ahead of him with a jangling set of keys, releasing the animals one by one and seemingly unconcerned by the behemoth following in his wake.

And then, afterwards, when Alfred has swooped his corporal form over the little town and swallowed their memories, they head home, the boy taking three hopping steps before bursting into the air, happy and finally free.

His name is Dick, and he eventually takes Bruce’s hands- more human, now, if toned a little too grey to be actual flesh- and tells him a story of a boy who had parents who loved him and a monster who was human through and through and a monster just the same. 

“But I’m here, now,” this little boy says, with wings that are three times his height and a heart even larger, “and you and Alfred are going to be my new flock, and we’re going to be okay.”

And funnily enough, they were.

* * *

There is a castle, up on a mountain not so far away, that they say is haunted by a man shrouded in black. 

But whispers have begun, too, of a little boy who you can spy circling those black hewn towers of you look up at them at just the right time of day, those silvery white wings catching the light and reflecting all the way back to Gotham.

Ridiculous, of course. Bedtime stories to be told to children, and yet-

There is a boy who has scuttled into town. A street rat, if you will, with magy hair and a sharp tongue and sneaking hands that always grab from vendor stalls and gold pouches.

The leader of their little village grows tired of the complaints. He orders the boy to be cast out-

But no one can catch him. He’s a sneaky little thing. A fast one. His eyes are bright and calculating and he can fight like the devil if you put a hand on him.

Except that’s the problem- no one _can._ They’ll chase him up and down the streets of the town yelling bloody murder as the kid stuffs fresh fruit into his mouth and grasps as coins. But the moment they corner him-

He vanishes. 

Completely gone, as if he was never there in the first place.

Like magic.

Not that anyone believes it. The alleyways of the town are full of nooks and crannies a desperate little scrap of a boy could cram themselves into. When you’re in a rush, it’s easy to be slipped past.

There’s a perfectly logical explanation.

And yet….

One day some of the elders tells the boy the story of the haunted castle, of the shadowed man who takes little children who do not learn to respect their elders and obey, and the kid huffs and throws a fit, young and brash and most definitely not _scared._

Of course not.

And so when the kid announces the next day that he is going to find the castle and prove it all a rumour, no one is surprised. He would not be the first young brash soul to do so. He would not be the last.

But here’s the difference: this one never came back.

* * *

Dick plops down on his shoulder- light even now as a teenager, all hollow bones and massive wings- and tells him, sullenly, that another human has come to the castle and is rucking up trouble in the old ballroom.

Bruce sighs, pats his kid on the head, and then turns into a massive creature of shadows and death. This is a usual shtick, by now, and he’s not expecting anything much from the entire experience.

Except here’s the difference: the kid sees him and his shadowy tendrils and his gaping maw, screams, and then there’s a faint pop and the boy turns _invisible._

Bruce blinks. There’s a smell in the air. It tastes like magic.

It is not his own.

He shrinks, his giant form seeping and condensing into coiled tendrils of darkness and then he’s simply a slightly off-putting, slightly off-coloured, oversized man. He crouches, eyes searching and-

_There._

A breeze pushing past a curtain that should not be there. His grey hand lashes out-

Grabs, pulls the struggling, yelling kid close to him.

“You have magic,” he says, just to make sure. He remembers his father, the way he would let Bruce curl up in a shadowy mess on his lap while he took out his spell books, his warm voice reverberating through the room.

Those books haven’t been used in a long time, now.

The boy in his grip freezes, breathing hard. He’s flickering in and out of sight: a poorly cast spell of a poorly trained wizard. 

“So do you,” says the kid. Bruce shakes his head.

“I don’t have magic. I’m magical. There’s a difference.”

“What?”

“Nevermind.”

Silence. The kid is starting to get over his fear, starting to tense up and get ready to fight. Bruce doesn’t want that, he wants the kid to feel safe. He wants him to-

Stay.

Besides, a poorly trained magic user can severely hurt themselves if they don’t know what they’re doing. He has resources, books and scrolls. It makes sense. Logic. Solid logic. Alfred would approve.

The kid should stay.

He should _definitely_ stay.

It might even help with the crushing feelings in his chest that occurred whenever Dick left the castle to go and ‘find himself’ or hang out with that sightseer at the other side of the mountain range. Who knew?

This was very sound logic.

So he said so.

“You should stay here,” he says to the kid he doesn;t even know.

The kid is in full view, now, blinking rapidly and tensing up even more. Still preparing to fight, to run, to _leave-_

He doesn’t get how brilliant this plan is. Bruce tries to explain his logic.

“I have food, resources, books-”

Suddenly the boy freezes, perking up, looking him right in the eye.

“Did you just say _books_?”

Bruce nods. The kid, who he will soon learn is named Jason, _grins._

He will also soon learn that Alfred will not be satisfied with his logic and that Dick really likes knowing about additions to his flock beforehand, but that’s no matter.

Jason stays.

* * *

There is a clearing in the forest that lets out by the mountain, and some say that it is haunted.

There’s an eerie song that originates from there during midsummer’s eve, an echoing twisting melody that all who hear cannot help but weep. It warbles through the entire night, this aching breaking thing, and is gone by morning.

The elders whisper of elves and fae folk who used to inhabit those deep underground caverns, until the miners came and drove every last one of them out. They say that the song is a curse, a voice left behind to haunt their once home and remind all who enter of what they were forced to lose.

It’s fake. It’s all fake. Just stories to keep old folk entertained when life offers them little else. And if anyone hears such eerie tunes, then it is just wind rustling through the trees and the power of suggestion. 

Once or twice, someone has tried to find their way to the clearing on the full moon, just to prove it, and always always they have gotten hopelessly lost. 

And always, always, they wake up with no memory of falling asleep, a circle of mushrooms guarding their sleeping heads.

Not that it means anything.

Of course. 

There is no such thing as mythical beings. Not here. 

Not in _Gotham._

* * *

Bruce winds his way through the woods. The magic is thick, here, and deep. It twists even _his_ finely tuned senses, a labyrinth of layers and mufflers and misdirections.

And yet, still, the song. Always the song.

What a mourning, aching tone. A song of loss and desperation. A song of wanting to be found. Always here, always present, a call in the dark echoing once a year who wanted so desperately to be found.

Before, Bruce had ignored it: it wasn’t his place. But Barbera- Dick’s seer friend who was quickly growing on him with her sharp wit and her capability to make his boy smile- had said it was important that he try to find it, tonight.

And so no longer.

He creeps his slow way through the maze of magic playing all around him, careful not to step into any unexpected traps.

And then-

The clearing is awash in glowing lights, swaying in the tall grass like miniature moons. There is a figure in the middle of a circle of mushrooms weaving magic in the air, singing this tired morning song, and it’s-

Tiny. 

It’s far, far too small, and Bruce feels a sinking in his gut.

He clears his throat, and the boy- just a little boy, just a _child,_ how long has he been all alone?- spins like a shot. 

He’s so pale he’s nearly translucent, even to the tips of his black hair. His eyes are the most colourful thing about him, too large to be completely human and an intense watery blue that latches onto Bruce’s gaze with the sharpness of a hawk.

And then there’s the ears, long, pointed and curved, jutting out above his head. Bruce _knows_ those ears.

Moon Elf.

Except, that can’t be right, because-

“Where’s the rest of your colony?”

His jaw snaps shut. Stupid idea, asking questions to any sort of fae, espcially as one as seemingly hardened as this one.

But it’s not _right_ . Moon Elves live in colonies, massive, sprawling colonies that overtake the underground in miles upon miles of tunnels. Festival nights, like Midsummer’s Eve, there should be dozens of them out here, dancing and singing, if not _hundreds._

And yet here he is, looking and this one sole elf child, swaying all alone.

It’s not _right._

The boy is still staring at him.

Bruce takes a step forward. And then another. The kid does not move. 

This isn’t _working._

But Bruce knows better than to step into the ring of mushrooms and try to grab the kid on purpose.

Plan B, then.

He lifts his arms and makes an awkward imitation of a dance he’s seen only in drawings Jason had excitedly poured over with him: a greeting dance, one that says he’s a friend.

And then, quieter, more gentle-

“Where’s the rest of your colony?”

The elf swallows, hands falling to his sides. He’s so thin it almost hurts to look at.

“They left,” he says, and his voice is very soft and very distant, almost as if he’s speaking to the moon, “and they said they’d be back. And then they never came.”

Bruce swallows down a growl of anger at anyone who would dare abandon a child of their own free will.

The anger will not help. Not now.

“I’m sorry,” he says instead, and he means it.

The elf nods and turns away, starts singing that mournful tune. Bruce remembers, suddenly, that moon elves communicate over the long distances of the tunnels through singing. It’s part of the reason their ears are so large- to hear all the different frequencies and pick apart the messages.

He wonders if this kid is still calling for his colony, after all this time, hoping they’ll hear him and come home.

His chest aches at the thought.

And so he breathes and interrupts, again, clearing his throat.

The boy turns once more, liquid eyes trailing over him. Fae are clever terrible beings, if you anger them. There’s a reason the stories warn you to be careful.

But the child doesn’t seem angry or offended. He just seems sad.

And so Bruce lifts a hand and says-

“How would you like to come and join _my_ colony?”

The moon elf looks at him for several long moments.

And then- cautiously, slowly-

He steps out of the fairy circle and settles his pale palm into Bruce’s own.

“My names Tim,” he says, eyes steely and strangely calm all at once. 

True names are to be shared with only those nearest and closest to the heart. It will probably take years, before they even get close to such levels of trust.

“Bruce.”

But this will do for now.

* * *

Gotham is a perfectly ordinary place. 

The elder’s say there’s a castle on the mountain not so far away that is haunted, and a singing clearing that is haunted too, and there’s a pile of ash that doesn’t seem to blow away where once a circus stood on the outskirts of town.

But Gotham itself is an ordinary place. There is no magic, here.

And then, one day, a statue appears.

It is a statue of a girl, carved from some sort of strange crystalline material and rugged rock. Her eyes are wide open, curled hair resting low on her shoulders, face tilted up towards the sun.

No one knows who carved it. When people try to chip at the crystal and take it with them to sell, their tools of metal and stone chip and break and fall apart.

But that’s not the weird part.

The weird part is that it _moves._

One morning it’s in Town Square. The next down by the open air market. The day after that in some dingy alleyway. It becomes a game: who can find the crystal maiden?

No one thinks anything of it. A prank, obviously, being pulled to spice up their ordinary days.

But the elders say they peak out of their curtains at night and see her walking, a girl of carved from deep within the mountains coming alive with the moon and searching the town for someone to drag back into the mines and keep her stone heart company forever.

The elder’s say a lot of things. It’s all nonsense, of course. No one pays it any thought.

And if people double check the doors are locked each night-

Well, then no one has to know.

* * *

The Oread is looking at him, stance angry and unafraid, crystalline eyes reflecting the light of the torches all around them.

It’s been a while since Bruce has entered the village properly. It’s grown.

But he can’t focus on that.

 _“What,”_ the girl hisses through grinding rock teeth, _“did you do with him?”_

He hates dealing with mountain nymphs. They’re just so _stubborn._

(If Dick were here, he would be giving him an exasperated look. If Jason were here, he would be outright laughing.)

“ _Who?”_ he asks, for the upteenth time. He looks down on her, considering. 

She must be very young, only a couple hundred years old, considering how small her stature was: he’s met oreads who were practically mountains themselves, so tall the trees of the forest hardly brush past their knees.

 _(“Another one, Master Bruce,”_ Alfred would be saying, _"_ _Truly?”_ Bruce ignores that.)

“Tim!” she snarls, angry and righteous and bursting with it, _“Tim!_ _My best friend!_ He’s been missing for ages and I know you know where he is because _I can sense his magic on you!_ So. _Where. Is. He.”_

Bruce blinks down at the girl. The girl blinks back up at him, trembling all over with hotheaded rage.

 _This_ is Stephanie? The person Tim had been so beaten up about, coming again and again to the clearing to try and find? His sole friend in those many years alone?

 _That_ Stephanie?

Bruce looks at her. She glares back at him.

 _She must be lonely,_ he thinks, _and she’s very young._

(“Don’t you _dare,”_ says the Jason in his head, _“Don’t you even dare.”_

He opens his mouth.

“I took him in. Tim. We’re his new colony. He lives with me and the rest of my family.”

Good. Concise. Simple. He should leave it at that.

And then-

“You could come live with us too, if you’d like.”

The words slip out before he can get a handle on them.

_Damn it. Dick is going to be pissed._

The rage is all gone in her features, now, replaced by a blank look. Considering her face is made out of rocks, it’s very well done.

And then-

“Sure. I guess. Why not. May as well give it a shot.”

She turns and lumbers into the forest. Bruce takes a moment to gaze out at the village he looks at every night from his bedroom window, wondering on it’s growth.

Funny, how things change.

* * *

A storm has come to Gotham, howling on thatched roofs and pouring down thick layers of sleet. The villagers stay huddled up in their homes, praying for it to pass.

There’s a rumour of a ghost hiding in the eye of the storm, a translucent ghost with a rage in her chest no words can express. The elders whisper that she was trapped in this very town a thousand years ago, kept silent and still in a sorcerer’s orb where she was made to do terrible violence, when all she wanted to be was a free spirit of air. They say that if she is not appeased, her rage will wipe them all away entirely.

The towns people are starting to wonder where the elders get their information.

But they go about their day as best they can. Because clearly, clearly, there is no such things as ghosts, as vengeful wind spirits come to destroy them all. Gotham is a town of simple ordinary things, and mythical beings don’t fit that description.

Clearly.

But sometimes the curtains flutter when no one is near them and the window is tightly shut. Sometimes it almost seems that there is a floating girl walking over wet earth with bare feet and teary eyes, the storm billowing around her.

But when they look again, no one is there.

* * *

This is the fourth time the whirlwind has torn through the castle, and this time Bruce is determined to put a stop to it.

After all, this is no ordinary wind.

“ _Stop!_ Stop- please- stop for a second. Let me talk to you. _Stop.”_

The whirlwind slows, peters back and forth. It’s still sending papers and dust flying- _Jason is going to be so mad-_ but at least it’s not racing off in a wild goose chase.

“I know what you are,” he says, because he does. Tim had rambled about it for nearly an hour during one of his hyperactive moods, the ones he got into when he refused to sleep during the day so that he could spend time with his new colony and yet also refused to give up his natural nocturnal habits.

Stephanie, for her part, just laughs a lot and is entirely unhelpful.

But that’s not the topic on hand. Bruce refocuses. Takes a step forward, tries to keep his tone gentle: wind sprites, for obvious reasons, are known to be flighty.

“You’re an air elemental, right? A sylth?

The tornado wavers, for a moment, wavers, and then vanishes in a puff of vapor. All that is left is a floating girl, see-through and tear stained.

Her robes are ragged. Her hair’s a mess. Her eyes, when he looks at her, are haunted.

He knows those eyes.

(Sometimes humans are the worst kinds of monsters)

A sylth’s appearance reflects their emotional state. For this creature to look so worn down and ragged-

It curls up tight in his chest, ugly and scarred.

“What happened,” he asks, because he has to know, because this sprite has a story in her chest that’s been screaming to be told for days now, tearing apart his home and downpour on the human population of Gotham.

The air elemental lifts her hands, and though she does not speak, a bubble of water forms there, breaking apart into a little liquid girl. The girl soars around, full of silent laughter-

And then a man appears on her forearm, jagged ice sculpture marching forth with determination. The model lifts its frozen arms and points it at the laughing girl, encasing her in an ice sphere, trapping her.

No way out.

And then it all melts away, a story told without words and more than just rain water dripping to the ground. 

Bruce steps forward, because he can hardly imagine being air itself and having to be confined. He _can’t_ imagine.

He breathes. Stephanie will be laughing at him later. Again.

Dick will probably join in, at this point.

The others… well. They’ll get used to it.

“There’s a place for you here,” he says, words calm and slow, “if you want it.”

And the sylth who he will soon learn is named Cass looks at him and reaches out- hand made less of vapour now and something more solid- and grips his own.

Some things, you don’t need words for.

* * *

And so it goes, and so it goes. The town of Gotham goes through their lives, one day at a time, the stories of something more than ordinary chasing in their heels.

A merchant comes through from a foreign land and claims he sells wishes, glowing clinking jars at his belt. The elders whisper of an angry spirit taken from it’s life of luxury and cursed to one of servitude instead. 

Captured fireflies and pyrotechnics, they respond, and nothing more.

A drought overcomes the town, the sun blazing and burning and fire, and the eders whisper of Sun Elves to the East, how their city burned and broken and fractured. How their murning magic drained even the sky of it’s tears.

A bad turn of weather, they respond, and nothing more.

A series of animals begin to show up that have no place showing up in Gotham, sightings of exotic creatures like jaguars and tropical birds. The elders whisper of two siblings, brother and sister and partners through everything, and how the world dared them to survive in the face of travesty so many times they shifted into animals to do it.

Another travelling circus must have lost its animals, they respond, and nothing more.

The elders, after all, tell so many stories. They tell stories of a castle up on a mountain that is haunted by a man made of shadows, who once had parents who loved him and now has others who love him, too. They tell stories of flying boys now grown to be men with a wingspan to block out the sun and a flock bigger than any he ever imagined. Of wizards curled up in libraries for hours upon hours, pouring over old scrolls and telling their stories to anyone who would listen. Of moon elves dancing and singing on midsummer nights, no longer alone but joined by a gaggle of graceless supportive colony. Of oreads who were slowly but steadily growing taller and more secure, and the slyths that have taken to fluttering and laughing silently and care-free around them.

Of others, of others, of a boy who was cursed to be a djinn and carved his own destiny out of a wish freely given, who is angry but learning to live outside of what other people made of him. Of sun elves who mourn the loss of what has been but are learning that the love of his new home burns just as brilliantly as his old one. Of shapeshifters who change between bodies without fear, who have learned to embrace their true forms as everything and anything.

Of an old being with an old mind, who lives in the castle with all of them. How this mix matched group melds and lives and grows together, and how the old being lives on the minds of others, and how they don’t particularly care if he nibbles on the corners of their dreams. How that old being sneaks into the village sometimes and weaves stories for all those who care to listen, so as to make sure the legends live on.

Oh yes, the elders tell many, many stories. They’ve told them since the beginning of time.

The children look at them with wide eyed wonder. The adults make an effort to seem like they’re not paying attention. But their minds whisper of their focus either way.

Not that it matters: it’s all just make believe.

Of course.

Alfred smiles, elderly and kind, and pats a small boy on the head as he passes. Then he walks, suddenly unnoticed, through the streets of Gotham, minds flickering away from his fading physical form without a second thought…. 

After all, nothing strange happens here. The Gothamites know it better than most.


	14. we're not related but here's good news (friends are the family you can choose)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/14/2020
> 
> Chapter Title From Friends Are Family by Oh, Hush!
> 
> Did I choose the most dramatic, silly, over the top Batman song in existence for this Damian chapter? yes. Yes I did.
> 
> Prompts:  
> Maybe a little follow up fic to the bullied damian one? the lil bit of comfort was very nice and warm and made me exceedingly happy so i gotta ask for more of that. but!! if ur kinda done w/ that (which is so valid) maybe some protective batfam over damian? (badgertablet)  
> AND  
> Reread this and got hit with the absolute need to see Damian hanging out with friends like Colin, Maps, Maya, and Jon  
> He's got people outside of his fam that cares about him too  
> If it isn't rude of me, I'd like to prompt something with Damian and his friends, don't really care if it's about an adventure, a birthday party, or just hanging out, as long as it has Damian and his friends I'm good (ErzasCake)
> 
> Hope this satisfies you!
> 
> THIS IS A CONTINUATION OF CHAPTER FIVE!!  
> (Though you don't have to read that one to understand this one. All you have to know is that there were some pretty nasty bullies messing with Damian and he was sort of suffering in silence for a while. :< )

Dick looks tired, and Colin shifts nervously.

“Uh,” he says. Clears his throat. Tries to be more eloquent, “Uh, hi, Dick. Is Damian home? We were supposed to hang out today…”

Dick is staring at him. Colin shifts, words in his brain screaming at him, telling him all the ways the older man must somehow be pissed off at him. He wants to run, to  _ fight,  _ and the crawling feeling of the creature under his skin, drawn to the surface from anxious thoughts, only makes it worse.

He shoves it down. Because it’s not true,  _ it’s not,  _ because Dick is nice and soft and brilliant and Damian thinks the world of him. It's paranoia, is all. Colin will be fine.

Besides, it’s not the time for Abuse anyways. He and Damian had been planning this for  _ weeks  _ now, trying to cram in time they could spend together outside of costumes between Damian’s new school and patrol and whatever inevitable villain of the week was. There was ice cream at stake, here, and a rampaging Abuse wouldn’t help them get from Point A, the Manor, to Point B, the ice cream parlour. 

And then Dick opens his mouth, and Colin’s fingers grip into reflexive fists, and the man says-

“Yeah, yeah, of course. I’ll call him right down. But Colin?”

He swallows, shoves his hands deeper into the pockets of his worn down hoodie.

“Yes?”

“Do me a favour, and be… gentle with him today. It’s apparently been a tough few weeks.”

Colin frowns. Because-  _ Damian? Gentle?  _ It didn’t want to compute in his mind: Damian was so ridiculously tough, and harsh words slipped off his back like water on a duck, or however the phrase goes.

But he thinks he understands, a little, when his friend eventually  _ does  _ come down, eyes shadowed and face pinched at all the wrong edges, standing stiffly and letting Dick pull him into a hug before he goes.

_ Something,  _ Colin thinks,  _ has gone very, very wrong.  _

His first thought, of course, is Scarecrow. Of dark lairs and nights filled with screams. But Damian doesn’t look gassed, he looks- Sad. Weared down. 

It’s not anything Damian is supposed to be. But Colin knows better than most the ways emotions don’t always stay where you want them to be, that they don’t always respond with logic and grace.

Emotions are ugly, visceral things.

So he swallows, hard, and clenches his fists. He’s going to figure this out, help Damian deal with it, and go from there. It’s only right, considering their friendship, considering how many times Damian has helped  _ him _ in the past.

So he doesn’t comment on the quiet behavior, simply chatters enough for the both of them. When they eventually get to the mall he pulls his friend along to the various shops that looks interesting, goads his friend into buying a new sketchbook, and then orders the most outrageous sundae he can think of. 

Damian allows it. Follows along. Interjects comments when the situation calls for it and pays for Colin’s ice cream without batting an eye. 

But though the sad eyes persists, the tension loosens, the other boy relaxing in increments. 

Good.

And then, finally, just when Colin was considering how to broach the question-

“There were some students. At the new school. They weren't ...kind.”

The redhead blinks, because  _ detectives _ . Damian stirs his chocolate ice cream and doesn’t look up from it once, face blank and voice monotone.

The whole story spills out all at once. The bullies. The animals. The  _ cat- _

It makes him sick just thinking about it, and Damian was dealing with it all alone.

He wants to ask- _ why didn’t you call me? _

But he knows better. Knows that his friend is an intensely private person. Knows that asking for help is something he struggles with so much more than Colin does, even if that same fear of abandonment rests under both of their skins. He knows.

So he clears his throat, reaches out and grabs Damian’s hand, squeezes fast and tight and sure, like he’s seen the nuns do, sometimes, when people come to them in grief.

“You know what you need?” he says, and his friend finally meets his eyes.

“What?”

“A few hours at an animal shelter. C’mon, I know the one down on fifth has puppies. It’ll be fun.”

Damian blinks.

And then-

“I suppose.”

And they go.

* * *

Maps isn’t sure how the hell Timothy Drake-Wayne got her number. But he did, left her message saying to come over and cheer her friend up because people are assholes and he’s growing tired  _ (read: concerned) _ over all the moping.

The whole thing has a vague feeling of creepiness surrounding it, and is definitely for sure entirely illegal.

So, on the whole, on parr with her Wayne experience so far. 

But that’s how she found herself, here, in front of Damian Wayne’s room, yellow backpack weirdly auspicious and bright in the dark and quiet halls.

Huh. No wonder Damian’s so crabby all the time: if her whole family lived like a bunch of vampires, she’d be pretty crabby too.

But, from what she got from the late night, rambling phone call, that’s not what the problem is at this moment. So she takes a deep breath, buoys herself up, and yells as loudly and as obtrusively as she can, “I’M COMING IN!”

And then she slams the door open.

Damian looks up from where he’s reading his book, unimpressed. He’s got an oversized hoodie and a pair of sweats on, which is perfect for the venture she has planned out, which obviously means this excursion was meant to be.

He glowers at her.

She grins in response anyways. 

“Hallo, there, this is Maps Mizoguchi, and I’ll be your conductor of this here Cheer Up Train today! No, I do not take criticism. Yes, you will be coming, like it or not.”

Damian looks at her. Maps continues to try and project the brightness of the sun.

Silence. One second passes. Two.

“Is this necessary?” 

She nods empathetically.

_ “Yes.” _

More silence. More glaring. He’s trying to grind her down to nothing with his eyes but the jokes on him because she’s eaten no less than three bowls of frosted flakes this morning and the sugar high is acting like a gold star in Mario Kart: she’s  _ invincible.  _

“...Fine.”

Internally, she does a victory cheer. And then, just for good measure, she does it externally as well. Damian just sighs and stands up, shoved his hands in his pockets and looks at her with expectant blankness.

(He looks tired and world weary and faded around the edges, and it’s such a strange sight to see on his usually brash demeanor. Maps works around it, focuses on the mission, and tries not to offer too many healing hugs.)

“Pack a bag,” she tells him, grinning, “and bring your sketchbook.”

Tim ends up driving them to their destination, headphones over his ears and fingers tapping on the steering wheel. He doesn’t say anything much beyond a general, awkward greeting, but she supposes it’s better than the half-crazed ramblings of the phone call.

Once they’ve started off- Damian double checking that his water bottle is firmly closed- she leans over and whispers, “I can’t believe your brother is chauffeuring us all the way there! He must really care about you.”

The look her friend gives her is so horrified she bursts out laughing.

But then, eventually, they’re there at the Challenger’s Mountain, fresh-air trails ahead of them and feet tucked neatly away in their hiking boots. Tim waves, tells them to be careful, says he’ll be waiting in the parking lot, and vanishes around the corner.

Maps waves him off. Damian, standing beside her, rolls his eyes.

They climb. An easy, beginners path that the boy could probably have done blindfolded. But Maps isn’t crazy trained or anything, and this is just for _ fun, _ so she swats at him until he stops complaining and then nudges him until he starts pointing out all the different plants and animals they pass.

It’s fun. Good. The air is brisk and clean, this far away from the city, and she breathes it in and tilts her head skywards to soak up the dappled sunlight through the trees.

Finally, they reach the outlook, and the pair of them set up with their sketchpads. She’s got a city scape to complete, twisting roads coming together and falling apart, the foundations of which Gotham is built on.

But Damian is sketching the slowly setting sun in the distant horizon, swift strokes and blurred lines, and so she tries to stick on them, sketching instead the mountains they’re in, trying to replicate the  _ You Are Here  _ map she took a glance at when they started the trail.

It’s quiet except for the sounds of nature, but she kicks her legs and sticks out her tongue, tracing small dashes up and down this natural plymouth of rock. Funny, how many people walk these same trails every day, grinding down the dirt and packing it smooth.

Repetition and persistence: two familiar tasks. She glances over at Damian and beams at him, the forty-seventh time so far today. 

This time, she is rewarded with a small smile in turn.

* * *

There’s a boy waiting for her outside of her school. 

Maya freezes, considering, analyzing the threat. But this is a young teen with hardly any muscle definition and none of the hard lines that come with assassin training, even if his eyes were shadowed and weary.

Probably safe, then.

So when he inevitably spots her and waves, awkwardly, for her to come over, she does.

“Hi,” he says, smiling crookedly, “Maya, right?”

She nods. Waits for him to make his case with unimpressed eyebrows, a look she’s been practicing this upcoming year.

“My name’s Cullen. I’m Damian’s new foster brother- uh. Well. Not  _ new  _ per se. But newest. You know what I mean.”

She nods, slowly.

“Did he send you? Is something wrong?”

Cullen’s fingers wrap tighter around his messenger bag. A frown pulls at his lips.

“No, I came by myself. And everything’s… fine. No emergencies. I just think- I think he could do with some friends, right now.”

The teen is looking intently at her, even though the hunch of his shoulders gives away how awkward he’s feeling. Maya feels a little awkward herself. Because she and Damian weren’t  _ friends,  _ really. They were acquaintances. Allies. Fellow assassin-raised children trying to get out of the business.

But then she thinks of late night conversations, laughing about the boy and how he still has  _ baby  _ teeth and-

Well.

The teen is here for a reason.  _ Something’s  _ wrong, even if it’s not anything to do with vigilantes and super villains. 

So she offers a small smile, more of a quirk of the lips than anything, and says, “Okay, I’ll consider it. Um- thanks. For thinking of me.”

“You’re most welcome.”

Which is how Maya ends up in the Batcave. 

The  _ Batcave. _

It’s more space than she expected. And also more filled with junk. And also more filled with  _ people.  _

Damian is across from her, sweating, stance patient and waiting. She tries to keep her eyes on him and not on the hovering familial units who all just so  _ happen _ to have to be downstairs at this very moment where she and the current Robin decided to spar.

She can’t afford the distraction: a couple of years and added height have only added to Damian’s fighting abilities. He’s keeping her on her toes, if nothing else.

Luckily, however, she has also improved.

It’s amusing, really, swinging and dashing and throwing punches without intent to maim. She can see why people do this for fun, make a hobby of it. If she didn’t already do it most nights, she might even follow suit.

Moreso, it’s amusing to watch all the Bats all around her pretend not to jump every time she moves too fast or Damian fails to dodge. 

Overprotective. The whole lot of them.

But also, it’s clear that her friend needed to spend some time out of his head, to blow off some steam and settle back into some sense of mortality. It’s obvious that something happened here, something with Damian, and as a result everyone walking on eggshells around him.

Guilty, emotionally constipated egg shells.

Not that she has much room to brag: she had meant to ask what had happened and instead what slipped out was, “So, hey, do you still have any baby teeth I can help you get rid of?”

Damian had glared- something like amusement flashing in his eyes- pointed at her accusingly, and demanded a rematch from a fight two years previous.

Because  _ friendship. _

* * *

Jon is practically vibrating when he hears the familiar sounds of Jason’s truck, because  _ finally,  _ after practically  _ a billion years _ , Damian is  _ here.  _

Dad would remind him that superspeed makes his sense of time wibbly wobbly. But Dad can’t hear his thoughts, so take  _ that,  _ Dad.

Kon, besides him, offers him an amused look. He places one large hand on top of his head and jiggles it around a little bit.

“You okay in there? Not about spontaneously combust?”

Jon ignores him, bats him away. He needs to  _ concentrate.  _

Because Damian’s here and Jon has already done all his chores and Grandma made  _ pie  _ and this is going to be  _ so much fun.  _

Stephanie is the first to spill out of the car, jumping out of the front seat like the whole car was on fire. Harper and Cass unfold behind her at a much slower pace, grinning, offering waves and greetings to the Kents as they go.

Jon isn’t worried too much about them: they’ll be gone with Kara by tomorrow morning. Some sort of all-girls camping trip. 

But then there’s Tim, who Kon sees and grins, waving dramatically even though he’s only a few feet away. The shorter teen rolls his eyes and snorts, throws his bag over his shoulder and takes the few necessary steps to swat Kon in the face.

(Jon  _ likes  _ Tim. After all, someone has to help keep his older brother’s big ego down: he can’t be responsible for that solemn duty  _ all  _ the time.)

And then-

Then there’s Jason, eyes a little steely and, more importantly, besides him-

_ Damian. _

Jason has a hand on his brother’s shoulder, something that looks reassuring and warm. Jon remembers the phone call, how his parents had frowned and shaken their heads, something like pity and something like anger in their faces. The news following had been that some of the Waynes would be spending the weekend at the farm-

But Jon had to wonder what spurred it on. For now, though, he puts it out of mind,

Damian shrugs the grip on his shoulder off, steps forward in order to try to shake hands with his grandparents-

But nope, nope, they’ve wasted far too much time already and they;ve got so much stuff left to do. Jon steps forward, reaches out and snatches the nad- ignoring the instinctive, ineffective nerve strike he gets in response- and starts tugging Damian towards his room. 

“C’mon,” he says, excited and talking too fast, “Let’s  _ go. _ I’ve been waiting for literally forever.”

Behind him, Dad calls, “Your superspeed is making your sense of time wibbly wobbly!”

Jon ignores it, beams at Damian.

Damian raises an unimpressed eyebrow.

“You do know what literally means, don’t you? “

But Jon can see the twitch of a smile pulling at his friend’s lips, so he’ll call it a success.

His friend seems a little rough around the edges. Like a wound that's healing healing but still sore to touch. 

Jon grins extra hard to make up for it. Hopefully, a trip away from the doom and gloom of Gotham will be good for him.

“Grammar lesson later, fun times now. Me and Mom built this  _ awesome  _ fort out of haystacks the other day, you gotta see it-”

* * *

“EAT MY FUMES, SUCKERS!”

Bananas. Bananas are everywhere. Maya fidgets with the controller, trying to make it work in her favour, but there are just so many  _ goddamn bananas- _

She slips. Her character falls dramatically off the side of the raindbow and into the nothingness of space, along with all her inhibitions.

“ _ Shit-” _

“Maya!”

“Eh _.  _ I mean- _ Shoot.” _

She shoots Colin an apologetic look. Which he doesn’t get to see because he’s too busy dying as Damian’s character shoves him roughly off the road. Damian’s look of absolute focus compared with Colin’s one of utter betrayal is, of course, priceless, but it would be funnier if she hadn’t fallen prey to  _ another bananas. _

_ “Who keeps spawning the fudging bananas because I’m going to kill you-” _

Maps, besides her physically and lapping her on the screen with Toadette, cackles.

“NO ONE SHALL DEFEAT ME NOW!”

There’s a crowd of kids in one of the Manor’s T.V.’s rooms, Mario Kart blaring across the sound system, and an endless amount of frustration from four friends as the fourth absolutely  _ rocks  _ Rainbow Road.

“Why are you so  _ good  _ at this?”

Jon’s awed tone cuts through the chaos of the music and wails of the falling characters, but Maps only laughs evilly in response. At this point, she has lapped all of them, and is utterly bound to win unless a miracle occurs.

_ Again. _

Toadette starts to her victory lap. Damian grumbles, crosses the finish line thirty seconds later, and then immediately demands a rematch. His cry for another chance to win is matched near immediately by his other competitive friends.

Maps, who has won eighteen races out of eighteen so far, readily agrees.

Duke, from where he’s perched outside, sneaking glances into the room filled with all these different mix match personalities, can’t help but smile. It’s good to see Damian playing. Good to see him with people his own age, playing. Having fun.

A shadow walks up behind him. Bruce’s eyes are soft, when he peers in at his kid and his friends, and his hand on Duke’s shoulder is warm. 

“Is he going to be okay?” he asks, because he’s young and still finding himself in this family, but he  _ cares  _ so much and he wants, desperately, for his younger brother to be happy.

_ “How is she beating us? How?” _

“ _ You’re the super kid, here, can’t you use your powers?” _

_ “I am using my powers!” _

_ “Seriously? She’s beating you when you have  _ _ superspeed _ _?” _

_ “You and Dami are trained assassins and your skill sets aren’t helping much! It’s not just me!” _

_ “FALL BENEATH MY FEET, PEASANTS.” _

_ “You scare me, Maps. You really, really scare me.” _

_ “Quiet, Colin, you’re ruining my concentration-” _

_ “She’s gonna win anyways-” _

_ “Oh, COME ON-” _

_ “REMATCH!” _

Bruce smiles, his hand tightening on Duke’s shoulder in a comforting squeeze.

“I think he’s going to be just fine.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Does anyone else find it really cute that Damian has all these canon friends and- for the most part- the people he latches on to are these massive sweethearts with a lot of optimism and brightness?  
> Reminds me of a certain acrobat... I honestly find it adorable.
> 
> (But also, seriously, I've never read any of these comics with ANY of these characters- everything is based off of their wiki articles- so if you wanted to let me know if I'm in the right ball park, I'd be superbly grateful.


	15. how can the world want me to change (they're the ones that stay the same)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/15/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From I'm Still Here by John Rzeznik*
> 
> PROMPT: Can you do a story about Bette Kane meeting Barbara Gordon for the first time? (Tsukiakari1203 )

Bette’s nails click against the table, a rhythmic pattern of someone who struggles to stay still. They’re short, her nails. They have been for a long time.

You can’t get a good swing on a racket with nails a mile long.

You can’t throw a good punch, either.

But that doesn’t mean they can’t be pretty: she’s painted them with spirals of red and yellow, a small way of carrying her vigilante persona in her civilian life.

She taps them across the table, again and again and again.

There’d been a situation in Gotham. Full on Arkham breakout, chaos everywhere, destruction en masse. The Titans had been called to help deal with damage control, and after eight hours on the field Flamebird had gotten an unlucky inhale of Joker venom, gone down with heaving gasps of laughter.

Bette Kane is used to smiling, but the one that had been pulling at her lips had been unnatural and terrible and stretched too wide.

The antidote had been delivered fast, Bluebird injecting it into her calf without hardly even stopping. But still- she had been taken out of active duty and sent here, to Oracle’s hideout, to have blood tests done and be sure of no lingering side effects.

She’s nervous, she thinks, which is a weird thing to feel. Bette Kane doesn’t  _ do  _ nervous. She’s a tennis prodigy and an Olympic level gymnast and swimmer, and drop dead gorgeous to boot.

Bette Kane knows these things about herself. She has it all in folders neatly in her mind, right alongside how to flash a charming smile for the cameras, what clothes make her legs look good, and how to pin her hair up in any number of ways.

She’s been told these things about herself since she was five years old.

Beautiful, blonde-haired, blue-eyed all star girl wonder. These are not bad things, of course, but-

But she will always be more than what other people label her as.

Bette Kane is an adrenaline junkie. She snorts when she finds things funny and can and will eat entire cans of spaghetti hoops on her cheat days.

She’s a vigilante. She goes out in the dead of night and fights crime behind the animosity of the mask: she gets dirty, she bleeds, she bruises black and blue. There’s this soft and _ fierce  _ thing in her heart that calls for her to be a hero, to stand up for what she believes in, to protect those who cannot protect themselves. 

And yet-

She’s nervous.

On her wrist is a beaded bracelet- a cheap homemade thing held together by twine and a double knotted loop. It clashes with the colours of her suit, and it could really do with a proper wash in the sink with soap and water.

But she wears it anyways. A little girl had given it to her, tonight, smile brilliant and missing a tooth. 

She focuses on it. Taps her fingers.

And she is definitely, definitely nervous.

Because there, just to her right, sitting straight spined and focused at her multitude of computers, is  _ Oracle,  _ Barbara Gordon, original Batgirl. The woman’s glasses are catching the light of the screens, and her red hair hangs like a war banner, tumbling down her back in it’s loose ponytail.

She’s wearing sweatpants and a look of such intensity on her face that Bette almost wants to shy away from it. She’s fierce- this woman, this soldier, this intelligence operative. She’s fierce and utterly brilliant and Bette-

Bette, with her skin tight suit and her flamboyant costume of red and gold, feels almost small besides her. 

It’s ridiculous, of course, because Bette is a hero in her own right. She’s saved the day, fought dirty in the underbelly of Gotham, and been apart of any number of Teen Titan groups. She’s come far from her beginnings, she has, but-

But this is a woman besides her who has been serving the vigilante community for almost half her life. This is a woman besides her who has served the vigilante community for almost half her life. Who has bled and fought and been tortured for the sake of it. Who orchestrates some of the smartest and renowned heroes in the world and does it with ease-

And how can Bette compare with that?

It’s a humbling feeling, to sit beside her. Bette, who started wearing the costume not to help but because she wanted attention. Who kept the costume not to save but for the adrenaline rush. Bette, who had to get called out by  _ Nightwing,  _ one of the most long running heroes ever, before she got her act together.

But here’s the thing: she did.

She  _ did  _ get her act together.

People change.

Barbara Gordon sits beside her and Bette pushes down feelings of inferiority and shame and regret for someone she once was. This is how you grow, in the end- you acknowledge your thoughts and then you  _ move past them _ .

She breathes.

And then-

“You’re different than I expected, you know.”

Bette freezes. Swallows. The other woman still hasn’t moved, still clacking away at her computer, but the words seem to resonate, filling the otherwise quiet room.

Bette clears her throat. Smiles to cover her confusion: a helpful trick she learned when she was twelve.

“Excuse me?”

Barbara still doesn’t turn around.

“You. You’re different. What you did was really brave tonight.”

The bracelet on her wrist feels heavy, cheap plastic weighing down like solid steel. The little girl had been caught in a fire, and Bette had been close enough to get her out.

So she did.

_ Of course  _ she did.

But the words leaving Oracle’s throat seem mild, almost surprised. Like she hadn’t expected Bette to be so brave. As if putting on the mask each night isn't an act of courage in and of itself.

The smile on her face falls stiff.

Bette Kane has been labeled things all her life: beautiful, sporty, well mannered, and - when people take the time to remember it- smart.

But those are only a few. Labels are not always kind.

Attention-seeker. Vain. Selfish.  _ Bitch. _

Those dry, mild words leaving Barbara’s mouth sound more like the latter than the former.

“I’m a hero,” she says, and if it’s a little snappy she can’t bring herself to mind, “saving people is  _ what I do. _ ”

“But it wasn’t always.”

She freezes.

_ “Excuse me?” _

And finally, finally, Barbara turns around. Her eyes are sharp behind the lenses of her glasses, and the blonde gets the distinct feeling that this is a woman who fought for her position through every step of life, who struggled and worked and carved herself open to become the person she is today.

_ (People change, people change. We are not static. We are not in the void.) _

This is a woman who has never once backed down on broadcasting whatever message to the world she felt it needed to hear, negative responses be damned.

Bette is not going to be the one who stands in her way.

Babara turns, looks at her, all sharp edges and unshakeable logic and bleeding heart, and she opens her mouth and she says-

She says-

“You were sixteen when you first put on a costume. You were brash, and young, and  _ stupid _ . That’s not the problem: most of us were, when we first started up. Wearing spandex and calling yourself a hero isn’t for the reasonable.”

She says-

“The problem was your reasons were shallow and your motivation selfish. You did good, but not because it was good and not because the world needed someone to step up and save it. You fought because you liked fighting and you liked the press and you liked being a savior, and you fought because you wanted a boy to like you back.”

All of this is delivered in a quiet, firm, voice. Matter of fact. Clinical, even. Bette feels like all the deepest darkest pieces of herself are being dragged up from within her core and being displayed for the world to see. Her cheeks feel hot. Her fists clench at her sides.

And Bette responds, tight- controlled-

“I’m not that girl anymore.”

Because she’s  _ not. _

Bette planted a better version of herself in rich dark soil and helped herself to grow in all the things that matter. She cut off ugly, shrivelled things that society had told her since she was young were what was most important: that her value came by the attention she could attract, that her strength came from the men she drew to her side.

_ She  _ did that. No one else.

Because here’s the thing, here’s the thing-

It is not a crime to be beautiful. It is not a crime to wear lipstick and pink. It is not a crime to like makeup and dresses and barbie dolls. It is not a crime to be wanted.

It is not a crime to be feminine.

Bette Kane wakes up each morning and spends an hour putting on makeup. She does it sometimes because she needs to paint battle armour over her features, to put a layer between herself and the rest of the world.

Looks can be a weapon. Anyone who tells you otherwise is fooling themselves.

But here’s the thing- sometimes Bette spends an hour putting on makeup just because she wants to. Because it’s fun and she likes how she looks with full lips and bright eyeshadow and pretty nails cut short. Because this was something she once did because she thought she had to and now it is something she does because she  _ wants _ to.

Flamebird doesn’t wear makeup at all. She used to, but not anymore.

Here’s the crime: Betty Kane grew up in a society that attached her worth based on her gender and her looks, and it made her petty and selfish and vain. It took nearly twenty years before she grew out of it.

But she did. And that’s the thing, isn’t it?

Petty girls grow up to be women. They are not trapped as who they were when they were sixteen. They are not static. They do not exist in the void.

_ (People change. We are unchanging in our ability to change.) _

Bette breathes. 

_ I’m not that girl anymore. _

She’s not.

And Barbara is looking at her, scrutinizing, analyzing. Comparing. 

Barbara Gordon was young, once. Young and afraid and facing a society that whispered lies in her ears, too. While Bette tried to bend in a thousand directions to appease, Barbara seethed and ranted and pulled on her own make-shift mask, vowed to make her heart stone so that she could dive head first into the worst of humanity and save those who could be helped and still come out breathing.

It’s a different narrative, and you can’t compare them. These two young women and their histories are more than just check boxes to be judged.

They’re alive: how can they be anything less than undefinable?

This is a woman based on facts and logic- the foundations she built for herself when she was young and terrible and grappling with a world filled with injustice. She is not afraid to hurt others with her sharp tongue, not when it comes to seeking the truth. She is not afraid of being burned.

She can’t afford to be.

She’s got people, out there, risking their lives every night for a cause that does not end. She cannot afford to be gentle when the ones she loves most in the world walk a thin tightrope of survival. She cannot afford to be nice in the face of a revolution that she carved into her own chest, simply because it was the only way she could find a life worth living.

Barbara Gordon is not soft. She is practical and brilliant and more than a little dangerous. She fights for what she knows is right and she throws her whole being into it, because she doesn’t know how not to.

Her hubris is her greatest enemy. It always has been.

But here’s the thing- Barbara Gordon is more than just that young girl who pulled on a mask because the injustice of the world made her feel like she had to. She has learned to see the lights in the dark worth fighting for, the way the colours mesh into grey. She has learned to see the people who stand behind the faces of victims and villains and everyone in between.

_ (People change. They are not static. They do not exist in the void.) _

Barbara Gordon walked a world that was black and white. She doesn’t any longer.

Vindictive girls grow up to be women. They are not trapped as who they were when they were sixteen.

Bette Kane looks at her, something fierce in her eye, something brave and honest. “I’m not that girl anymore,” she says, and Barbara- who says harsh things because the truth is so often unkinder- believes her.

“I know. I’m glad.”

_ (We are unchanging in our ability to change: it is what makes us human.) _

These two young women, they sit across from each other with their experiences vastly different and their journeys to this very moment worlds apart, and yet-

And yet, here they are. Breathing the same air. Fighting for the same cause. Revolutions on their tongues and growth they defined for themselves. 

Changing and aching-

Forever wonderfully human.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I don't know much about Bette and I've never written her before, but I hope I did her justice <3
> 
> Also:
> 
> OOOOOOHHHHHH WE'RE (almost) HAAALFWAAAY THERRRRREEEEEEE~~~~


	16. a white flag waves in the dark (between my head and my heart)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/16/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Five, by Sleeping At Last*
> 
> PROMPTS:  
> Maybe a Dick as Batman? Could be lighthearted like this one (temp-fill in) or not so LOFL, if your muse wants to go more serious. I enjoy fluff and sugar too, if that's your preference. (Anon)  
> Something with Steph and Dick? She's apparently going to be the next Nightwing, so they need more interactions. Also, we just need more Steph content in general. (KrazySuperGirl)
> 
> WARNINGS:  
> Bruce's "death" and mourning affiliated with it. Also, minor character injury.

Monday, and Dick misses the feeling of the wind in his hair.

It’s silly, really, with everything that is going on, that that is what he’s hyperfocusing on. Tim and Damian are at each other’s throats, Jason has vanished off the map, walking out of the manor on the fifth day and not coming back. Stephanie is gone more often than she’s not, Barabara isn’t talking with him, Cass is in Tokyo, and Bruce is…

Well, Bruce is dead. 

And here he is, brooding on a rooftop, and all he can think about is how he can’t feel the wind in his hair when he swings anymore.

It’s such a small thing and yet-

The cowl on Bruce’s costume doesn’t allow it.

His costume, now, he supposes.

Yeah.

Dick sighs, stares out at the city he has loved and fought and bled in. It’s different than Bludhaven, and yet in so many ways it is the place he still instinctively calls home.

But he didn’t have any intentions of coming back. He didn’t-

Gotham molded him, growing up. It shaped all his hard edges and carved itself into his bones. He’s loved this place and hated it and still and still and still it was always always  _ Bruce’s  _ city, never his.

But Bruce isn’t around. Bruce isn’t around and what could Dick do? What could he  _ do? _ Damian is just a kid and Tim isn’t much more than that. It would be unfair to leave them all in Alfred’s hands, who already has done so much for them and is mourning the loss of a son. It would be unfair to just upheave them all and relocate to his crummy Bludhaven one-bedroom apartment. It would be unfair to leave Gotham to be swallowed up by all it’s darkness, a smear to the legacy of the man who gave his all in his mission to protect it.

It would be unfair-

A part of Dick wants to scream, wants to scream and rant and rage because he’s never wanted this, he never wanted to be Batman and wear the cowl, bear this horrible weight of responsibility. Because he’s twenty-two and he’s young and he’s got these lives cradled in these palms still learning to be grown and this  _ entire situation is unfair  _ and there’s nothing he can do about it. Nothing he can do to make things better.

But Dick breathes. Here he is,  _ breathing _ . 

Bruce isn’t the first person he’s lost. 

He won’t be the last.

You’d think the pain would get easier. You’d think you would- get used to it. That once your mind made enough neural pathways of dealing with grief walking them would get easier.

You would think. 

But it’s not true. The grief is crushing and all-consuming, every time. It does not care if it has visited you once or twice or a dozen times. It does not care.

It aches.

And here he is, still breathing.

Dick holds his splintering composure together because  _ someone has to _ . Someone has to be a rock in this crisis. Someone has to be reasonable, to stay behind, to pick up the slack. Someone has to  _ be there,  _ has to lead, to mentor, to be patient and kind when everyone lashes out with words of mourning disguised as cruel barbs.

Someone has to.

And if there’s anything Dick is good at, it’s being what other people need him to be.

So here he is. Breathing. Living. Talking through closed doors as Tim curls up in the dark of his room. Keeping his cool as Damian rages and curses and shoots knives with his sharp tongue, even as the abstract blades cut deep. Calling Cass, checking in, covering bases. Insisting Alfred sleeps before he works himself to an early death. Trying to find Jason. Trying to make amends with Babs. Trying to balance Batman and Nightwing. Trying to handle quitting his job with law enforcement and taking over Wayne Industries both. Trying to manage the league and the move out of the manor and into the penthouse-

Trying.

Dick Grayson tries. He tries with everything he’s got, throws his whole being into it, and the entire time something bitter and aching in his chest says  _ why does it always have to be hard, why does it always have to be so damn hard- _

And all the time there’s this grief in his chest, weighing him down, swallowing him alive. You would think it would be easier and yet-

* * *

Tuesday, and Damian and Tim have been fighting again. There’d been blood, and Dick wraps his younger brother’s shoulder while the teen looks stubbornly over his shoulder, jaw clenched tight and hands held in fists.

Dick wonders when it got so difficult between them. Talking to Tim used to be so easy, that bright eyed kid with his camera and crooked grin and eyes utterly  _ brimming _ with intelligence and potential and just utter  _ enthusiasm- _

But that’s the thing. Kids grow up.

And now there’s only silence, and he doesn’t know how to break it. Doesn't even know how to try.

_ Why does it always have to be so damn hard- _

He ties off the bandage, keeps his hand heavy on the teen’s shoulder.

Clears his throat.

Nothing comes out.

But someone has to. Someone has to and Tom’s lost too much already, his parents and friends and now Bruce and he can’t lose his brother too, Dick won’t  _ let him- _

And so he sighs- and he sounds too tired, he knows he sounds too tired but what can he do- and pulls the younger boy into a hug.

At first, Tim stays still and tense, but he only holds on tighter in response until eventually,  _ finally,  _ thin arms wrap around him in turn and his brother relaxes by increments, a soft breath of air rustling the hair at the nape of his neck.

Dick closes his eyes and pulls him close.

He wants to say, “ _ We’re going to be okay,”  _ but he knows all too well how it will only sound like empty promises.

And so he says nothing at all.

_ (Tim isn’t the only one who’s lost too much.) _

* * *

Wednesday, and Dick dials a number he knows by heart and lets it ring through.

_ “Hi, this is Bruce Wayne. I can’t come to the phone right now, but leave a message after the tone and I’ll get back to you as soon as I’m available. If it’s an emergency...” _

He’s lying on his bed. Damian is at an animal shelter, Tim is out with what is left of the Titans, and Alfred is shopping. There’s no one to keep up a smile for.

The beep is harsh in his ear, and Dick closes his eyes.

“Bruce, I-”

His throat is too dry. His face is rapidly growing too wet.

“I don’t know what I’m doing, Bruce. Everyone’s so  _ lost,  _ without you here, and I-”

He curls into himself. Everything is so unfair.

“Bruce, how come- why did you-”

This grief is crushing him. It’s eating him alive.

“I don’t know what to do, B. I don’t- I don’t-”

_ Breathe, breathe- _

The call ends. Dick cries silently into his pillow and dials again.

_ “Hi, this is Bruce Wayne. I can’t come to the phone right now...” _

* * *

Thursday, and Batman finally tracks Spoiler down.

She’s sitting on a rooftop, staring down at the world as it passes without paying her any mind. Dick isn’t surprised by this: Robins, former and present, find themselves up high when faced with a problem. It’s instinctive.

He sits clunkily besides her, and in response she offers a small grin. Dick offers one in turn, because there’s no one up here to see, and because he read, once, that sometimes the simple act of smiling can make you feel better.

That, and because it’s what he does when everything is falling apart. Dick Grayson smiles and tries and makes it work, and if he can’t he simply smiles harder.

“Hey,” he says, voice soft. 

Stephanie hums, swings her feet over the thousand foot drop like it’s the most natural thing in the world.

For them, it is.

“Hey yourself.”

Silence falls and Dick clears his throat.  _ When did talking get to be so hard? _

“So- uh- how are you holding up? With all of this. With- you know.”

The swinging stops.

She’s not looking at him. Leaning forwards, hood obscuring her face and shoulders hunching to her chin. The curve of her smile makes her look vulnerable; younger, somehow. 

“I forgot that you’re not Tim. You actually want to- talk. About emotions and stuff.”

Dick smiles. It feels weird, pulling at his cheeks.

“Someone has to.”

She hums again, starts swinging once more, but her body language stays tense and her hood hangs low, obscuring her masked face.

Dick thinks that, if he was wearing his Nightwing suit, he’d be swinging his feet with her. That he might have smiled more, done a couple of tricks, would have challenged her to a friendly spar.

But with Batman’s cowl over his head and the kevlar armour weighing heavy, he simply sits and waits, staring out at the city below.

He’s tired, he thinks. He’s very, very tired. And he watches the city move on without him and feels stuck in static, exhaustion creeping into his veins and making itself home there, where it is not welcomed and cannot be reached.

The quiet is interrupted by Stephanie.

“I keep forgetting he’s gone,” she says, and Dick listens. “Like- I- He felt invincible, almost. I know that he’s- that he was only human. But-”

“But I wanted to think that, come hell or high water, he would be there. And he’s not.”

Silence, silence, it tears at his throat and leaves it dry. The wind blows, and he wishes he could feel it in his hair.

And Stephanie continues, quieter now-

“We never talked about it, ya know. About- me. And Leslie. And how I… died.”

She swallows.

“I always thought we would. That it would come up and we’d- figure it out. That we’d get a chance to apologize, or something. Lay the whole thing to rest.”

She snorts. It is not a kind sound.

“Too late for that now, I guess.”

Dick closes his eyes. He wonders what he would have said, if he had known. He wonders what he would have done if he could have told Bruce something- anything-

But that’s the thing about death: it’s never convenient. It does not care whether or not you’ve gotten a chance to say goodbye, if your last words were raised in anger or soft and gentle and kind. If your last words were meaningless and thoughtless, everyday little things that you will go the rest of your life wondering about because you can’t remember it, can’t remember the specifics, because it had been so automatic at the time-

It does not care. It is not  _ fair. _

Dick breathes. A thousand feet up and he breathes and he breathes and he breathes, and he makes it work.

“Yeah,” he says, “I know the feeling.”

He wraps his arm around her. She lets him.

And they sit, and they watch the world go by.

* * *

Friday, and Dick finds himself shaking into Alfred’s shoulder. 

He’s not sure what brought it on. Maybe nothing, maybe a compilation of everything. But he was sitting at the breakfast table and he had been staring at his mug of coffee, except the mug wasn’t his mug-

It was Bruce’s. 

_ Bruce’s  _ mug. He knows, because he was the one who bought it. He’d been fourteen and mischievous and had gone shopping with Alfred.

The coffee cup had been on the clearance rack, fifty percent off,  _ World’s Greatest Grandpa  _ written on it with bolded comic sans.

A stupid, ridiculous gift. It meant nothing. He had bought it to see the look on his mentor’s face when he opened it. Had laughed at it, snapped a picture to send to Wally-

And yet-

His throat closes up tight, mug landing on the table too hard and something clawing at his chest, tearing at his heart, because Bruce was never going to get that chance. He was never going to get a chance to retire, to rest, to write that novel he sometimes talked about when patrol was running long and slow. He wouldn’t get the chance to grow old. He wouldn’t get the chance to be a grandpa, not to anyone, not anymore.

(Dick had pictured it, once or twice- being a dad. Having kids. Bruce grey haired and with smile lines, humming babies to sleep with his deep baritone and finally, finally content-) 

And now-

And  _ now- _

_ You would think it would be easier- _

He doesn’t realize he’s shaking until Alfred kneels in front of him, tired eyes and shoulders bowed. He doesn’t realize his eyes are wet until the old man pulls him close, curls gnarled fingers around his head and starts murmuring meaningless platitudes.

He doesn’t allow himself to cry, but he does allow himself to be held.

This is not the first time Alfred has done this, has pulled him close. Alfred is not tactile but Dick had been younger and smaller once, had come crying in search of comfort late in the night, had shaken himself apart when getting an unlucky inhale of fear gas, had shattered at the seams when panic crawled it’s way out of his throat and left him helpless and panting for breath.

And now, here they are again.

All this grief in his chest, and it is swallowing him alive.

_ You would think it would be easier, and yet- _

* * *

Saturday morning, and he wakes to Stephanie in his room, rummaging through his clothes.

For a second, he’s silent.

And then-

“What are you doing?”

She continues on, seemingly unconcerned.

“Looking for a hoodie.”

Dick tries to wake up, tries to understand.

“Yes, okay, but why are you doing that in _ my  _ closet.”

“Because,” she proclaims, as if Dick is being the most unreasonable man in the world, “the hoodie is for you, doofus. Now c’mon, put it on. We’ve got places to be, sights to see, books to read-”

He slowly levers himself out of bed.

“Steph,” he says, trying to sound kind, trying not to snap, “I’ve got a lot of stuff to do today, I don’t have time for-”

But she interrupts him, bats his worries away like they were physical projectiles.

“Already covered. Now,  _ c’mon, _ get dressed.”

And Dick looks at her, and then he does.

They end up at her university's library.

It’s so weird and inconspicuous, being here. The occasional person sends Stephanie a wave as she passes, but otherwise they’re ignored, the place practically abandoned but for the rare responsible student working their way through their homework.

There’s a young adult section on the bottom floor. Dick looks at Stephanie, bewildered, and she gestures dramatically before grabbing a copy of  _ The Mysterious Benedict Society  _ and settling in to read.

He takes longer, trailing his fingers over the spines. He and Bruce used to do this: sneak out to the public library and read for hours, there, crammed into whatever nook they could find and sharing the parts they found interesting or funny with each other. Sometimes, they would pick out books for the other person to try. 

Dick’s eye catches a familiar green cover.

_ The Hobbit,  _ it says, and he remembers Bruce’s calloused hands handing it over- so much bigger than his own, back then- and how insistent he was on Dick reading it.

He picks it up. Breathes. Sits down and begins to read, letting the world of magic and dragons and grand adventures take him far away and escape, if only for a little while.

Nearly five hours later, and they’re sitting on a park bench, munching on pre-packed sandwiches and watching the ducks. He’s got a baseball cap pulled low and sunglasses over his eye, but most passerbys don’t give him a second glance.

And then Stephanie says-

“You’re allowed to grieve, you know.”

He freezes, but she’s not looking at him. She’s watching the sky, the clouds as they meander past above them, unconcerned for their mortal woes.

“What?”

“You. You’re allowed to grieve. You don’t- you don’t have to be strong all the time. You don’t have to be _ him.” _

Dick swallows dry.

“I know.”

And she looks at him-  _ looks at him-  _ and her eyes are very blue.

“Do you?”

All this grief in his chest and it will not leave. He has carried it before and will most probably carry it again and it is not fair and is not kind. It swallows him up, all this raging anching sadness, it curls up in his heart and it rests there, heavy.

You would think it would get easier, and yet it doesn’t.  _ It doesn’t. _

This is why: grief is love. Grief is every aching terrible ounce of love that you have carried with you all your life. It is all the love you have given and all the love you meant to give.

And love is not finite. It is not something you can count or measure. It is not something you can hold in the palm of your hand. And yet-

And yet it is human. It is so achingingly terribly  _ beautifully  _ human and it does not stop just because the person it is meant for is gone.

It does not get easier because  _ this is grief:  _ love, but with nowhere else to go.

And Dick breathes and he breathes and he breathes, and it swallows him up alive.

Stephanie is still looking at him, steady and still, and he bows his head and presses his thumbs to his eyes.

“Someone has to keep things from falling apart. Someone has to keep it together, and it’s not fair to make you guys-”

“It’s not  _ fair  _ to put it all on yourself, either! It’s like- a plane. It’s like when you’re on a plane and the oxygen masks drop from the ceiling compartment: you have to help yourself before you assist someone else. You have to be in a good frame of mind before you can take everyone else’s problems onto your shoulders.”

She takes his hands, squeezes them.

“Let us  _ help _ , Dick. You don’t have to do this alone.”

He breathes.

“Okay,” he says- tired, conceding, alive, “okay.”

the wind is blowing through his hair. When he smiles at her, it feels more real than it has in a long time.

* * *

Sunday, and Dick wakes up, ready to try again.


	17. i know you (i walked with you once upon a dream)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/17/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Once Upon A Dream, Sleeping Beauty*
> 
> PROMPT: TimKon? pls? with fairytale craziness? thanks (Anonymous)

Everyone is laughing, and Tim hates his life.

“You can’t be serious,” he says, not so much because he does not believe the situation- with the life he lives, he has lost every capability of being surprised- but because the entire thing is so ridiculous that he feels he has to put the words out there. Some sort of token normalcy for his crazy world.

But Clark is nodding seriously, even though Tim sees something glinting in his eyes that looks suspiciously like mischievousness. The kryptonian has his hands clasped neatly in front of him, and the teen likes to imagine he’s grasping a bouquet filled with all of Tim’s many regrettable life choices.

For example: associating with Conner Kent.

No- wait- even further back- associating with the hero business at  _ all. _

His life would be so much simpler if he had never connected the dots between Batman and Robin and their identities, is all he’s saying. He’d probably also be getting a lot more sleep.

He’d  _ also  _ probably not be dealing with his traitor siblings, everyone giggling at his expense andJason making a particular effort to cackle as loudly as possible.

Tim is ignoring them, because traitor siblings don’t deserve his attention. Clark, seemingly, is also ignoring them, all his attention focused on Tim.

Which…. Doesn’t really help the situation.

He pinches the bridge of his nose.

“So,” he says, as calmly as he can, “what you’re telling me is…. Kon got in over his head with a magic user, got caught up in said  _ four year old _ magic user’s alternate reality _ ,  _ and is now fast asleep in a high tower like something straight out of  _ Sleeping Beauty.” _

Harper pops behind him, grinning like the cat who’s got the cream.

“And you have to kiss him!”

Inhaling sharply, he smiles forcibly at Clark and shows her the finger behind his back. This, of course, just makes everyone laugh louder.

“And I have to kiss him.”

Superman claps his hands, and now Tim knows for  _ sure  _ that the look in his eyes is outright  _ evil  _ mischievousness, because the world is out to get him and it’s just his luck that the Big Blue Boy Scout would abandon him in his time of need.

“Yes! You got it. Now, do you need a lift, or…?”

Tim sighs.

On one hand- sleep. He has his own big bed with soft pillows and a heavy comforter, waiting just upstairs.

On the other hand- Kon is his boyfriend. He should  _ probably _ save him.

It really isn’t a choice, when it comes down to it.

“Let me get changed.”

The peanut gallery continues to cackle and throw teasing comments at his retreating back. Tim points at them all and gives them the stink eye.

Being siblings, not a single one of them is affected.

“Let me know if you need help applying your armour!” calls Dick, grinning madly with a giggling Cass under his arm. Duke, who has been recording this entire time in order to show Bruce later, lets out a laugh that sounds more like a squak than anything else.

Tim glowers at them.

_ “I hate you all-”  _

His proclamation only makes them laugh harder.

Siblings are the worst.

Apparently, this is the story:

There’s a magical artifact that was stolen from an ancient magical community hiding in the crevices of society. It grants wishes, any wish, but to do so it deconstructs reality as it is known and creates a new one as it is desired by its user.

And a battle took place over this, as battles so often do, and in the end the magical artifact went careening into a river and vanished with the current.

When it finally washed to shore, a four year old picked it up.

A four year old who’s favourite story of all time just so happened to be Sleeping Beauty.

A four year old Superboy had approached, soft and gentle and kind and so good at conversations with strangers in ways that Tim could never be. The child had wanted someone to play with: he got it.

And now there’s a pink bubble engulfing Metropolis’ Centennial Park.

Now, this doesn’t sound particularly threatening, but when considering the fact that it is larger than most olympic stadiums, it becomes a little bit more concerning.

The imagination of children: terrifying.

Clark gently places him down right in front of the barrier, gives him a cheerful salute and flies away. 

Somewhere, behind him, he can hear the kid’s parents yelling, calling out. Their two other kids are by their side, a boy and a girl, terrified and resolute and stiff-limbed. He catches a glimpse of all of their faces, grim and worried. He sees the way their hands shake.

He breathes.

Red Robin stares at the bubble apprehensively, gently reaches out to touch the squishy membrane- which with a little pressure gives under his hand.

_ Do it for them _ , he thinks, because he’s a hero and that’s what he does.

_ Do it for Kon,  _ he thinks, _ suck it up and get it over with. _

Tim is getting so many cuddles out of this. Hours of cuddles.  _ Days  _ of cuddles. He thinks it’s in their relationship contract somewhere:  _ when one rescues one’s idiot boyfriend from a ridiculous situation, one gets  _ _ all _ _ the cuddles. _

If it’s not, it should be amended immediately.

And then he takes a fortifying breath and pushes through.

It’s an odd sensation: like walking through a cloud of cotton candy, or a ball pit that’s balanced on a bunch of helium balloons. He takes one step after another and feels the brush of unfamiliar magic combing through the surface of his mind, washing over his skin with trickling sensations all down his back.

He shakes the feeling off and comes out on the other side.

And then he blinks, because it’s so goddamn  _ bright _ . 

The trees spiral up like ice cream cones, neon orange mixing with neon yellows, strange bobbly fruits swaying in circles around them. The grass under his feet is purple and almost bouncy in texture. There are no less than thirteen rainbows in his line of sight, and he’s pretty sure that he can spy a herd of gold and silver unicorn prancing in a nearby meadow filled with house-sized flowers. In the distance, there’s a massive castle piercing the sky.

Again: the imagination of children, terrifying.

Also, he’s wearing a cheesy prince’s costume. 

He grimaces at the outfit, knowing that it’s an illusion and knowing all too well that that little fact will be absolutely  _ no  _ help to him until he leaves this little sugar plum fairy reality. 

_ This may as well happens,  _ he thinks, and takes the time to be grateful that at least he’s still got his mask.

Kon would love this, he knows. Would find the whole thing charming. Would probably run off to try and befriend the unicorns. For a moment, he wishes that the other teen would be here, besides him, and they’d be embarking on this little quest together.

Then he sighs and ploughs on, bouncing from one patch of purple plant to another, wondering as to when this kind of thing became his life.

* * *

He walks for what feels like miles, and for no time at all. The reality moves around him, giving way to a vivid teal sunset, the grass under his feet becoming less bouncy and more fluffy, and then all too suddenly he’s walking on clouds.

It’s all part of the illusion, of course, but still- it’s disconcerting. If he steps too hard and lifts his foot, he can see the lands he was walking through below- the tops of neon trees and the multitude of rainbows- despite the fact he never once had been increasing in elevation.

Weird.

He continues on, one step after another, following the tower tops he can see piercing the clouds some distance away. He can’t tell if they’re closer. But at least it’s somewhere he can situate himself with.

And then-

And then he hears the giggling.

He freezes, peers around him, trying to catch the source of the sound. There’s nothing but white for miles except-

_ There.  _

Movement, a small figure making their way through bushes made of clouds, which have suddenly materialized from… somewhere.

The figure is hard to see because they are  _ also  _ made of clouds.

He clears his throat. Behind his back, his short prince charming cape flutters in the wind, nothing like the reassuring weight of the one he wears when in his Red Robin uniform.

“Hello,” he calls, awkward sounding. He’s not sure what’s a polite way to greet others among cloud people. “Can you help me? I’m looking for a… friend.”

The figure pops up properly- hardly coming past Tim’s knee. The wisps of her hair curl around her face is ever moving strands. Her eyes, white and too big for her face, feel like they’re looking right through him.

“A friend!” she cries in a cheerful high pitched voice, “A friend! There are no friends around these parts. Just beezlebugs and jeeblejoys, if you know what I mean.”

Tim, in fact, does  _ not  _ know what she means.

“Right,” he responds, more confident than he feels, “of course. Are they a bother to you, those beezlebugs and jeeblejoys?”

The girl looks at him like he’s just said the stupidest thing in the entire world. Who knew clouds could be so expressive?

“They’re  _ beezlebugs  _ and  _ jeeblejoys.  _ Of course they’re trouble! They’re trouble for everyone in the whole kingdom! That’s what they _ do. _ ”

Tactfully, he doesn’t mention that they’re the only two people here. He just nods confidently instead, and hopes his look of knowing will be taken at face value.

“Ah,” he says, “of course, of course. How silly of me. Well, how about this: I’ll help you get rid of the beezlebugs and jeeblejoys, and then you help me find my friend?”

Making deals with the subconscious creations of a four year old is so not what Tim thought he would be doing this morning.

“But there are no friends! Not here! Not in the kingdom! Everything is lonely and sad and nobody wants to play. Just beezlebugs and jeeblejoys, I already  _ told  _ you!”

As the cloud girl yells, the white clouds beneath their feet become staticky and grey, cackles of lighting lashing out and  _ up _ at the magenta sky above them.

_ Deescalate,  _ he thinks,  _ deescalate- _

_ Gods, Kon is so much better at this than him- _

But Tim isn’t helpless, either: he’s comforted more than his fair share of kids out in the field. So he drops to his knees, ducking down so he can look at the cloud child in the eye, place a comforting hand on their hardly-present shoulder.

“Oh, shh, shh- I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to upset you, really. I’m sorry that it’s lonely here, that I wasn’t listening. I’ll do better next time.”

The grey slowly seeps out of the girl, draining into nothing as quickly as it had come.

He continues, slowly, softly.

“I wasn’t telling you the truth, before. I’m not looking for my friend- he’s more than that.”

“A best friend?”  
“More than that, too.”

Puffy eyebrows narrow.

“A best friend  _ forever?” _

Tim shakes his head.

“No, no- he’s my. Boyfriend. Like-”

But before he can continue, he’s cut off, tiny puffy hands clasping onto his face and pulling him directly in front of the cloud child’s.

_ “You’re true love!?” _

Tim smiles crookedly, awkwardly. Tries not to breathe too hard in fear of blowing the being away.

“Sure. I guess that’s what you would call it here.”

The tiny tyrant flaps her whole body at him incredulously.

“Well why didn’t you  _ say  _ so?”

“I suppose I didn’t think it was that important?”

“But it is! You’re on a quest for true love! That’s only the most important thing there is!”

Conflicted. Tim is feeling conflicted. Because he can think of many things more important, in a logical matter. Food is more important, survival. The mission he is bound to uphold whenever he puts on the cape. Saving innoscents. 

In a heart matter, however, his body thrums  _ Kon, Kon, Kon,  _ and wants to agree.

But that doesn’t really matter, does it? Four year olds will do what four year olds do, and if in this reality quests for true love are the most important thing there is, then he will play along, no matter his personal thoughts on the subject.

“Okay. Got it. So will you help me?”

“Oh,” she says, melancholy, “that’s why you should have said something before. Now I can’t help you at all!”

“Why not?”

“Because of the beezlebugs and jeeblejoys! They come out at night when the sun is not watching, and they’re  _ mean.  _ They won’t be my friends, and they never want to play with me.”

Tim licks his lips. A part of him just wants to leave, wants to walk on to the tower he can still see in the distance and find Kon by himself.

But the other part of him, the larger part, does take not of the fact that the sky has turned a milky twilight indigo, and protests loudly at the idea of leaving a child alone in the dark- subconscious cloud illusion or not.

So instead he nods and says, “Okay, how about this: I’ll help you defeat the beezlebugs and jeeblejoys, and you help me find my- eh- heh- my true love.”

The words tumble out of his mouth like stones. He can imagine them slipping through the clouds and falling to the earth below.

But the girl doesn’t seem to mind. She just grins, nods excitedly, and takes his hand- starts pulling him along.

He lets her.

They walk for miles, or perhaps no time at all. He wonders if this is how the world passes by in a four year old’s mind. He wonders if it matters.

The sky is beautiful, as they journey onwards. The girl made of clouds chatters on and on about the kingdom Tim has yet to see, about true love and how she’ll find it someday. About how life goes on and on and on and does not stop and does not shake, just bends and bends and breaks.

Tim listens and hums and watches the sky, the way flairs of orange twirl into existence and burst away again. The way the constellations have stood up to dance with one another, bowing and curtsying and waltzing across the universe in a silent pantomime.

Kon would have loved this. Kon would probably take his hand and ask him to dance, standing right there on top of the clouds with no music but the kind that plays in your head. Would have spun him around and around in the silver whisps, dipped him into the vapor and wiggled his eyebrows so excitedly Tim wouldn’t be able to do anything but laugh.

But Kon isn’t here.

And finally they approach a great cave made of a living storm. It shatters and crackles with lightning, and the little girl grips the tail of his jacket and glowers at it.

“Beezlebugs and jeeblejoys.” she hisses, angry and sullen.

And then, as if on cue, the monsters appear. Giant, ghastly things they are, emerging from the cavern and extending up and up and up. Their faces are full of jeering grins and their laughter is not kind or teasing, but mocking and cruel. 

Their faces also look suspiciously like the four year old’s older brother and sister. 

It seems like he’s not the only one whose siblings are the worst.

Suddenly, the cloud girl is gone from his side, watching behind a bush, and there’s a sword in his hand.

A sword he did not have before, and doesn’t necessarily know how to use, but-

But this is a land of a child’s mind, where heroes wear shimmery capes and true love is the most important thing, so he raises his chin and puffs out his chest, and he raises his sword and he yells at the two great beasts.

“Hey! Hey! Over here, you nasty beezlebugs and jeeblejoys! Come and get me!”

The great creatures turn on him, snarl and hiss.

“We don’t want to play with you!” they sneer, cruel smiles stretching their faces too wide. “Look at you! Look at you! Who would want to play with  _ you?” _

Maybe Tim, younger and more vulnerable, would have frozen stiff and lowered his sword. People, after all, are not so different when it comes down to it: young or old, we want people to want us.

Tim had felt unwanted for a very long time.

But no longer, no longer, because he’s older now, and has more hands to hold than he sometimes knows what to do with. Alfred, with his steady fingers and quiet mind, and Bruce with his firm calloused grip. Dick with his easy affection and care. Jason, with his mouth full of quips and rough hair ruffles, paired along with Stephanie and her listening ear and cheerful grin. Cass, silent and gentle and kind.

Duke, who laughs at all his jokes and pats him on the back like it’s nothing. Cullen, who shares portions of the newspaper with him in the mornings and talks politics. Harper, who punches him lightly on the shoulder and hands him coffee without him ever having to ask.

Kon, with his soft smile and soft eyes, who cuddles with him in the middle of the day and never complains about his snoring. Kon, who’s laugh is like the falling summer rain, deep and warm and everywhere. Kon, who knows how to catch him if he falls, who’s got his back in a fight, no matter what.

Kon, who takes him dancing, just because he can.

And so many others, too. There was a time that Tim felt lost and alone, but no longer.

No longer.

So he does not cower and he does not freeze. He smiles, all sharp and cutting edges, a show of teeth more than a greeting or a kindness.

He calls out, “Lots of people, actually!”

And then he swings in with his sword.

The beezlebugs and jeeblejoys collapse into puffs of condensed air as he touches them with his sword, one after another until they’re all gone, leaving a heavy fog in the air and something like peace.

The girl is before him, again. The blade has vanished from his hands, just like that.

“Thank you!” she calls, beaming. “Thank you! I knew you could do it!”

He laughs, pats her head for lack of a better thing to do.

“It was no problem,” he says, and he means it.

The fog all around them is lowering, now. Condensing into shapes, compressing and compressing to its most essential parts. The girl made of clouds doesn’t seem to mind- just points to a path that has suddenly appeared, indented in the white like a particularly loved pillow.

“If you follow the trail, it should lead you to the castle! That’s where your true love is waiting.”

“Thank you,” he says, because it seems appropriate. The stars have given away to miniature suns scattered across the skyline. He knows, logically, that they should be one and the same, but they’re not.

That’s the thing about imagination: it doesn’t have to make sense. It just has to be.

So Tim ignores the condensing fog making itself into shapes and waves goodbye to the girl of clouds, turns and walks down the path. It feels like an accomplishment. It feels like getting somewhere, finally.

He still takes the moment to turn around and wave. The girl waves back enthusiastically. By her side are two more people made of clouds, faces resembling the monsters that once had been, the siblings who hid behind a monster’s mask.

They all wave back, for a second, then two.

And then the turn and scamper off. Tim distinctly hears one of the new formations call out enthusiastically, “C’mon, let’s go and play!”

It makes him smile.

* * *

One moment he ambling along the trail, then a blink, a breath, and he is tumbling head over feet down a trapdoor and onto a slide made of glass, spiralling rapidly downwards and into a deep forest of indigo trees below.

He presses his hands to the sides- trying to slow his decent and missing his boots and gloves something  _ terrible-  _ but it has no effect. It’s like the glass has been coated with non-greasy grease, or something: he just goes and goes and goes.

And then he is not.

Tim lands with an  _ oomph,  _ staring up at a sky with hardly a cloud at all. He notes, with some interest, that the foliage is different, here. Trees do not spiral they  _ stretch,  _ scraggly trembling things that go on for miles, like a system of veins across the world. On the deep blue bark, scruffy white moss grows, smelling faintly of apples. In the distance, mountains cast shadows over everything.

He breathes.

Kon would have loved it here. Would have climbed the trees and swung back and forth across them, even though he could fly. Would have bullied Tim good naturally into eventually joining him. Would have curled around him in the branches and told stories about galaxies far far away, just because he can.

And then a voice, an old voice, groans, “Are you going to lie there all day?”

Tim clambers to his feet, whirls around, searching for the voice. Finally, he finds it- an old spindly person resting on a rocking chair at the foot of a cottage. They seem as if they have always been there, rocking and rocking and rocking away. Their white hair has grown so long it piles at their feet, and the teen realizes with a jarring realization that the moss on the trees is just this, miles and miles of pale locks.

The person’s eyes seem very old, like a millennia has passed and they have spent it sitting here, watching it go. The frown on their face suggests that they were deeply displeased by every minute of it, had started frowning at the beginning of time and has never stopped once.

Tim clears his throat.

“Hello,” he calls, hopeful sounding. He’s not sure what’s a polite way to greet others among old folk who never smile and have hair that goes on for miles. “Can you help me? I’m looking for a… for my boyfriend.”

“Say it as it is, laddie,” they intone, “You’re looking for your one true love and you’ve lost your way.”

Shrugging, Tim adjusts the shoulder pads of his costume so they sit a little more comfortably. Curls his hands into loose fists and pats them against his thigh. Curious, he thinks, that the subconscious creation of a four year old would manifests itself like this, with these old, old eyes.

He thought it might have only been him.

But then again,when he thinks about it, not so curious at all. Everyone has a part of themselves that must feel like this, as if it has seen the entire world and is in fact as ancient as the sands. After all, every second lived is the oldest a person’s ever been.

Even four year olds feel old, sometimes. Older than they once were.

Tim tries for a smile.

“Yeah, I guess. Though it wasn’t really my fault: a trap door opened up under my feet.”

The old sod shifts, flaps their hands like they no strength to lift it.

“Oh, that, that. That always happens. Life has a way of falling out beneath you when you least expect it.”

Tim nods, bluffs his way through.

“Of course. I understand.”

“You  _ don’t,”  _ they say, and it is angry and frustrated and sad, a frown that never ends. “No one does.”

“Then explain it. I’ll try to understand.”

The person looks at him with those old, old eyes. Then closes them.

“We were happy once, everyone in this kingdom. We lived far away and things were sometimes hard, but we were happy.”

Tim nods, trying. Kon would be so much better than this.

“And then one day, the Guardians came to us and told us they found a new land we were to travel to, one where everything would be fresh and bright and new, and so we went.”

“But the Guardians- they got us here and they sat down and they never got back up. We were lost, all of us, the entire kingdom, and so we scattered to the winds and tried to make do.

The frown deepens.

“And they’ve been there ever since. No matter what I did, they never woke up. They never, ever, woke up, and they never will again.”

Tim has a face to match the old person in front of him, just more confused.

“Where are they? The Guardians?”

A frustrated wave to the mountains shaping the sky, and he blinks and he shields his eyes and then they  _ widen. _

Because the mountains are not mountains but statues, two figures hunched over together as if in deep conversation, a massive plateau serving as a table. Over time, it looks like the world grew around them and over them, because life does not stop just because someone ceases to move.

Funny, how life is like that.

He tips his head back, and back, and  _ back _ . The mountain giants are bigger than his brain wants to comprehend. He wonders if this is how the world passes by in a four year old’s mind. He wonders if it matters.

The imagination of children: awe inspiring.

He swallows, tight.

“What have you tried?”

The old figure snorts, rests his elbows on his knees, frowns somehow even  _ deeper. _

“Yelling, shouting, breaking things, cutting things, fighting things, yelling at  _ more  _ things, crying, clinging-”

Tim interrupts, because something’s missing, something’s  _ missing- _

“Have you tried  _ talking  _ with them?”

The old person blinks, and for a moment there is something but oldness in their eyes.

“What?”

“Talking with them. To them. Climbing up there and- well- communicating.”

They look at each other, sitting and standing, young and old and yet also young and younger, caught in a balance that can last a millenia.

“It won’t work,” says the elderly who has been there for a millenia, who is older than they’ve ever been, and still has so much to learn.

“You won’t know until you try,” says Tim, who has faced the impossible a thousand times and still come out breathing. 

And so he goes, he climbs those mountains- who are guardians, who are humans. places one foot after another and goes and goes and goes. He goes for miles, or perhaps no time at all. 

The faces, frozen in relief, remind him of the parents outside the barrier, their grim and worried expressions, the way their hands shook.

He climbs.

When he is high enough, he can look down at the plateau. The lakes resting on top catch the lights of flaring butterflies the size of a large horse, and the shapes are all angular and stacked, like paperwork.

When he is high enough, he can see the veins of trees as they stretch on forever. This does not make sense: Tim has not walked for forever today. He has not even walked half of it, for forever is forever and there is not such thing. 

But imagination doesn’t have to make sense. It just has to be.

He breathes, blinks, and suddenly he is there, balancing on the nose of the woman Guardian, her eyes dark and restless and alive. Who knew stone could be so expressive?

He places his small hands as high as he can reach on her forehead, tries to catch his breath, tries not to look down.

It’s a very long fall: and he hasn’t his grappling hook. 

He clears his throat, breathes, blinks.

“Hullo,” he says, “there’s someone down there who wants to talk with you very badly. I don’t suppose you would mind going down there and having a conversation?”

The living stone blinks back.

A gentle hand, larger than a full sized airplane, lifts in slow motion. Still, even this has the earth trembling belore, the indigo trees upping their trembling, hearts about to burst for forever or a half of it. 

Kon would have _ loved _ this. 

He steps onto the hand, and gets gently lowered down. And as he goes the Guardians shrink, compressing and compressing to their most essential parts.

And he blinks, breathes-

And then he is on the ground, and the two stone Guardians move stiff-stones and full of grace, stepping only as tall as the trees.

The trees, who have suddenly stopped their shaking. Which stands still and waiting and expecting.

Not every heart must burst. Sometimes they simply must live.

They freeze, the two of them, completely in sync. And then the man Guardian kneels, finger raising in slow motion and tapping Tim on the head, a smile on a face that was frozen for a millenia.

And the world moves around Tim, not the other way around. It stretches and it pulls and it takes him away, moment after moment after moment. Before it is gone completely, he thinks he sees the old figure stand from their chair. He thinks he sees the frown lessen and fall away. He thinks he sees them smile, older than they have ever been, and still living.

It makes Tim smile, too.

* * *

He blinks and finds himself in a stereotypical dungeon. It’s cold, down here, and he wishes for his uniform, wishes for his  _ actual  _ cape.

And then there’s a cloaked figure outside the bars, and his attention refocuses.

The figure is tall. Taller than him by several feet, somehow not stooping despite the low ceiling, as if the castle itself decided to bend around it. Where there should be a face in the hood, there is only darkness.

“Hello,” he calls, tiredly. He’s not sure what’s a polite way to greet others among mysterious hooded figures. “Can you help me? I’m looking for my one true love.”

The figure without a face feels like it is glaring, despite the fact that it has no eyes to glare with. Despite himself, Tim is impressed.

“Well,” says the figure, “you cannot have him, because he’s  _ mine. _ ”

Tim crosses his arms in front of his chest: it feels ridiculous in the prince costume, but he tries to make it work.

“Superboy doesn’t belong to anyone: he’s his own person. And even if he  _ did  _ belong to someone, it would be me, considering I’m his one true love and all.”

“Not true,” the figure bellows, “not true! I said he was mine and thus he is. That’s how this whole thing  _ works. _ ”

Tim wants to get angry, but he’s talking to the subconscious creation of a four year old, and it kind of takes the wind out of his sails.

“You can’t make him do whatever you want: people don’t work like that. We like to make our own choices and live our own lives.Besides, it would make him unhappy.”

“Why?”

Tim sights, scrambles for words that don’t want to come.

“Because then he’d be here all alone, far away from his friends and family.”

_ Far away from me,  _ he doesn’t say.

“He wouldn’t be alone,” hisses the figure, and it might just be Tim’s imagination but it seems to be a little smaller, “he would have  _ me.  _ He said he wanted to be my friend. He said so.”

Wetting his lips, Tim curls his fingers into his biceps.

“Friends don’t make people do what they don’t want to. If you were  _ really  _ his friend, you’d let me go to him.”

“But- But-” and the figure is definitely smaller, now, compressing and compressing to its most essential parts, “But I don’t want him to go. I don’t  _ want _ it.”

He doesn’t know how to deal with this. With the words coming out of this being’s mouth. With the dark of the dungeon closing in. It’s been a long day. He’s tired. He wants Kon to cuddle with. He wants someone to be with who loves him-

_ The subconscious illusion of a four year old _ : and suddenly it hits.

Tim breathes deep and lets it go. Crouches low and watches as the hooded figure slowly shrinks in size to be level with him. He thinks he can see the glint of two pupils, peeping out from beneath the hood, now. The curve of a small nose.

He breathes.

“I think I get it,” he says, and this time he is not bluffing, “you’re lonely, right? Your family’s just moved to Metropolis and you’ve lost all your friends. Your siblings won’t play with you and your mom and dad are too busy to pay any attention.”

A small voice creeps out from under the cloak.

“They said it would be like living in a palace. But it’s not very fun, here.”

Tim looks around, wiggles his eyebrows like Kon does after telling a particularly bad joke.

“Ever consider it’s because you’ve spent all your time in the dungeon? It might be nicer upstairs.”

There’s a faint tremulous laughter, and it echoes.

And suddenly the dungeon is gone, and the cloak is gone, and the figure, too.

All that is left is a little boy. His dark skin reflects in the light of the sun outside. His bare feet rest small and cold on stone floor. 

Funny, how such great things come in small packages. How the world builds people and problems and lives up and up and up, and in reality all they need is to be compressed to its most essential parts.

“Hey, kiddo,” he says, and the kid runs and scampers up into his arms.

Later, they will leave this reality and it’s life unbound by logic or time. They will step out of the pink bubble and it will shrink, compressing and compressing to its most essential parts: a small crystal ball that fits in the palm of one’s hand.

Later, Tim will hand the kid off to his parents’ arms, will watch with tired eyes as the kid is embraced by all sides, as siblings latch on affectionately and stony faces clear. It will make him smile.

Later. But for now-

A blink, a breath, and they’re in the tallest tower. Kon lays out on a bed made of clouds, blue and gold and fast asleep. He breathes, even, and Tim looks expectantly at the boy whose imagination created a world all to its own.

But the child shakes his head, swings his feet.

“Not how it works,” the boy murmurs, digging his chin into Tim’s shoulder.

So Tim sighs, leans over with a kid on his hip and a lifetime under his belt, and presses as soft a kiss as possible onto his boyfriend’s lips.

A blink, a breath, and Kon’s blue eyes are looking at him.

“You found me,” he says, and it feels like something incomprehensible and warm in his chest.

Tim smiles, adjusts his grip on the boy, and smiles.

“I would have found you anywhere.”

Because that’s the thing about love: it doesn’t have to make sense. 

It just has to be.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys i'm so tired why do i do this to myself


	18. through the woods we ran (deep into the mountain sound)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/18/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Mountain Sound, Of Monsters And Men*
> 
> PROMPT: can you do something with Bruce and Damian bonding? (average_lasagna)
> 
> This is a short one, and I will probably add more to it later, but as of now I have a really busy day today. Sorry all!

Bruce takes a fortifying breath before he knocks on Damian’s door, preparing himself for any eventuality of yelling, fighting, or bladed weapons.

He doesn’t receive it. Instead, his kid opens the door scarcely seconds after the knock, eyebrows raised expectantly and posture loose and open.

“Yes?”

Damian looks at him. Bruce looks back.

Breathes.

It’s sometimes hard to remember that the child before him is no longer that angry boy assassin who first showed up on his doorstep. That he’s lived nearly a year of his life as Dick’s ward. That he’s grown, and Bruce wasn’t here to see it.

 _Breathe._ Dick is so much better at this.

But he opens his mouth and asks, as calmly and controlled as he can, “I was wondering… if you would like to do an activity with me.”

The eyebrows, somehow, raise even higher.

“What sort of activity?”

Bruce shrugs.

“Any kind of activity. What sounds good?”

And Damian _grins._

Which is how Bruce finds himself, some hours later, squinting at his canvas and trying to mimic the man with frizzy hair on screen. It’s harder than he thinks it probably should be, but that might just be lack of practice.

Besides him, Damian sits attentively, his brush making smooth strokes across his own painting. His kid’s masterpiece is much more put together than his own, and Bruce sighs and narrows his eyes at his squiggly little trees, trying to make them look more realistic, or at least less bent out of shape.

The man on the screen is talking about how talent is pursued interest. Well, Bruce has plenty of stubborn follow through, and he’s interested in getting better, because if painting is important to Damian than _dammit_ he’s going to make it important to him, too.

He realizes, distantly, that he’s never done this. That he had this kid under his wing for months and yet he never even tried to be a part of his life. He did it with Dick, with his acrobatics and cartoons. He did it with Jason, with his long lists of classic literature. He did it with Tim, with electronics and photography. Even with Stephanie, they had stopped once or twice to get waffles. At her insistence, of course, but _still._

But not with Damian. Never with Damian. Bruce had been too angry, too frustrated, too hurt to even make an attempt. There was this kid who had been thrown into his arms and every time he looked all he could see was all the ways he failed him, all the ways Talia had hurt them both.

Excuses, maybe, but their his. And either way, he’s here now.

Bruce breathes, apply a little bit of shoddy, shaky shadowing to his nature scene. The man on screen rambles on, keeping up easy going conversation. By his side, Damian lets out a quiet little hum of concentration, one ear covered with his headphones and one ear free to follow along with the video. 

It’s quiet, but not awkward like it was at first. The boy had gradually relaxed over increments, getting sucked into the act of painting, stroke after stroke after stroke.

Bruce breathes. He’d probably be doing better with his own work if he wasn’t constantly peaking looks at his kid through his peripherals. He finds that he doesn’t too terribly mind.

He wonders, vaguely, if Dick ever did this. Ever sat with Damian in comfortable silence and painted blank canvases full of colour and light. Wonders if Dick had suggested it, if it was tricky to cajole the kid into following along, if he came willingly, if it took weeks before it settled into this easy relaxation, if it was like this from the start.

He wonders a lot about that year, about all the things he missed. The weight of everything he gave up hands heavy from his chest, like weights strung up on his heart.

But he’s here, now. He’s _here._

Clearing his throat, Bruce leans towards Damian, and murmurs quietly so as to not drown the video out. “It looks good.”

His kid nods self assuredly, murmurs a quiet thank you in response, adds a thin stream of highlighting white to his fluffy clouds.

But Bruce can see the way he ducks his head to hide a tiny authentic smile creeping onto his lips.

 _Good,_ he thinks, _good, he deserves to smile._

And so they sit together, quiet and warm and following along with a man creating a happy little world all to his own, and it feels like home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I just want to let you know that they're totally following along with Bob Ross videos- Bruce just doesn't know cause he's an old fart. We love him anyways, tho.


	19. no matter where we are (it feels like home)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/19/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title Come On By A Great Big World*
> 
> PROMPT: For prompts I was wondering if you could do one on Duke finding out about each of the other kids pasts through the way that they act? (MayZar)
> 
> Warnings: None

_ Alfred is a theater nerd. _

Duke stumbles upon this little fact in a series of situations, one after another, until the dawning realization smacks him right in the face and suddenly life at Wayne Manor begins to make  _ so  _ much more sense.

Because Alfred is poised and polite to a T, but he’s also sharp as a whip and brilliant at shooting you down or bouing you up with just a look. There’s something  _ magical  _ about that man’s face, making him perfectly eloquent in communication without the use of a single word, and Duke bows mightily towards the old butler’s power.

And at first, he had assumed that it was simply the fact that the man was Batman’s  _ dad.  _ There’s got to be some sort of response to your kid dressing up in a giant bat onesie and sneaking off into the night to fight crime with nothing at his sides but his fists and enough bitter stubbornness and dramatic flare to run an entire country.

This misconception doesn’t last long. 

It’s the little things that add up on top of each other, one by one by one, until there’s no denying it. Alfred, when it’s his turn on movie nights, always picks musicals without fail.  _ Into the Woods, Mary Poppins, LaLa Land, Mama Mia, The Sound of Music-  _ if you can name it, it’s probably been watched by the Wayne Family.

The third time Duke sobs his way through  _ Les Miserables,  _ the sneaking suspicion is forming. 

That feeling is only added to when Duke starts doing his homework at the kitchen counter, working his way through calculus problems as the older man cooks, stereo playing softly in the background.

The soundtrack from  _ Annie  _ plays. Then  _ Singin’ in the Rain.  _ Then  _ West Side Story. _ And then  _ Beauty and the Beast. _

And so on and so forth. Most of the songs Duke doesn’t even  _ know,  _ and has to surreptitiously look up the lyrics on his phone to figure out where their from.

Apparently, there’s a musical rendition of  _ Matilda _ . Apparently, there’s  _ also  _ a musical for  _ Lord of the Rings. _

(Duke watches clips of it on youtube and is in complete and utter  _ awe  _ The orcs battle by flipping around on  _ springs. Springs!) _

But the final blow comes when they’re down in the infirmary and he overhears Alfred quote  _ Hamilton  _ at Bruce, completely straight faced and monotone, in the guise of giving advice.

Advice that Batman actually  _ takes. _

Because this is Duke’s life, now. Apparently.

He questions Dick about it.

Dick shrugs.

“Oh,” he says, casually, “Alfred’s always been like that. He used to spontaneously tap dance, too, actually. Good times.”

Duke can’t tell if Dick is joking or not, but either way he comes to the terrifying conclusion- after watching Alfred recite by heart an entire Shakepearean verse right in Damian’s face- that Batman is his dramatic, stubborn self only because of  _ Alfred’s  _ influence.

Because the old butler is a nerd. A complete and utter theater geek. 

_ Good,  _ Duke thinks, and uses his now substantial allowance to the pair of them tickets to see Hamilton for the man’s birthday.

The pleased grin he receives in response, the warm hand patting him on the shoulder, and sitting in front row seats bu Alfred’s side and watching the musical come to life in front of them makes it incredibly worth it.

_ Bruce is a hoarder. _

There’s probably a nicer way to put it. A collector, maybe. An accumulator? Who knows. But when you get to the center of it, Bruce is just a massive hoarder of basically everything and anything he can get his hands on, a magpie with every shiny thing that catches its eye.

It’s just hard to tell because his  _ house  _ is so big, and thus the amount of stuff fitting in the available space seems small in comparison.

But Duke’s not blind. And he’s prone to wandering. 

It’s a  _ lot  _ of stuff.

The cave is full of trophies and gadgets and gizmos. Grappling hooks from eight years ago that no one uses anymore. Old costumes that have grown out of. Souvenirs from alien planets, paperwork dating back a decade, and tokens of thanks from various civilians: any and all of it can be found down in the cave, if one cares enough to look.

Nothing is thrown away.

Upstairs, the hobby continues. kitchen appliances that are obsolete stack up in spare pantries. There’s an entire room of spare throw pillows. Nearly every spare wall has some form of artwork, be it expensive masterpieces, a painting Damian made, or a particular piece that caught the man’s eye at a street market.

Bruce has no less than seven sitting rooms in his house. Does he need that many living spaces? No. Does he have them? Yes.

Apparently, whenever the main parlour has to be redecorated to keep with the times and uphold Brucie Wayne’s image, the old furniture just gets relocated.

Duke, watching as said endeavor takes place- Cullen taking an awkward backwards journey up the stairs with table in hand, Cass nonchalantly carrying the other end- asks Jason about it.

Jason shrugs, peering at an armchair with calculating eyes.

“I dunno. It’s just Bruce’s thing, I guess. Every few years Alfred reminds him to donate a bunch of stuff to charity and there’s this huge upheaval. We make a day out of it.”

It could be paranoia- don’t throw anything away because someday you might actually need it. Could just be a hobby stemming from being rich- look at all the stuff I have! Could be something else entirely.

Duke’s theory? The old man is sentimental as  _ hell. _

The man’s office practically confirms his thoughts- there’s just about a hundred pictures hanging on the walls and stacked on Bruce’s desk, all with neat little black frames, all shining with familiar faces, spanning across years and years and years. When Duke looks closely, he can find Dick’s eight year old face beaming out from behind the glass, or Tim at twelve with a first place ribbon from a science fair project. Barbara peering cunningly over a chess board. Damian, grumpily staring out at the world while in costume for a mandatory school play. Eleven year old Jason caught mid laugh while reading a book or Alfred, with a full set of hair not yet grayed, posing with some people Duke is pretty sure is Bruce’s parents.

Family. Every last one of them- family. From years past and the present. He spies some people that look like members of the Justice League, out of costume. Cass at a ballet recital, caught mid leap. He spots Cullen’s first birthday at the manor, and Harper sticking her tongue out while balancing on a high-up tree branch. 

Graduations, ceremonies, adoption hearings. Casual moments captured in a second, hung up even though they’re a little blurry around the edges. Smiles. Laughter. Nostalgic little things to reflect upon, again and again.

Because Bruce is a complete and utter  _ sap. _

Duke sees his own picture up there, snapped right after he successfully scored a goal in soccer against Stephanie’s goalie skills. The blonde is in the background, dramatically flung against the goal post, face filled with faux mourning.

Seeing it there, hanging up with the rest of his new family, fills him with warmth.

_ Dick is fiercely independent. _

Duke doesn’t expect this, for some reason. He guesses he just had an automatic assumption that Dick lived his best life with the opportunities available to him, and with a billionaire as a father there were  _ lots  _ of opportunities.

Which is why the first time he visits the older man’s apartment is such a shock.

Because it’s small, and cramped, and has a leaky faucet and a strange pertinent smell that apparently won’t go away no matter what anyone does. Dick doesn’t seem to mind, calling for Duke to make himself at home, throwing his bag into his own tiny bedroom and heading for the only bathroom to take a shower. 

The man’s voice is warm, welcoming. Casual. There’s no shame, there, almost a sense of pride, of relief. This, obviously, is where Dick feels most comfortable, in these run-down accommodations he calls home. 

Duke is there for a week, spending a small portion of his summer there because everyone had plans and he was still settling in and his older brother had made promises of camping, something that he really enjoyed and had missed in the last year.

Dick had apologized, because he had to work for a few more days before he could take leave, but Duke had reassured him he could entertain himself while the older man was gone.

And he could! Still, he wondered. Why live here when you could easily be hooked up with a penthouse?

But the answer hits him in the face when they finally go shopping for their outdoor expedition, Dick cheerfully comparing prices and throwing cheaper goods into the cart, humming all the while. And Duke thinks  _ oh- _

Because Dick doesn’t let Bruce pay for  _ anything. _ Dick holds up his own weight unless it’s beyond all help. He pays for his apartment with his own wages and supports himself with a hard earned salary and creates his own tools and supplies his own med kit and-

And he’s happy with it. Dick likes other people for their company, not for the resources they can provide. Dick likes  _ people,  _ but he also likes the security in knowing that he paved his own way in his own life, determined his own future step by step by step, independent of a world of connections who would all too easily swamp him with luxury.

It’s admirable, when Duke thinks about it. That sense of independence.

Of course, it’s less admirable when Dick has a sprained shoulder and a broken arm and  _ still  _ insists on eating his dinner under his own power, taking mouthful after grimacing mouthful while everyone shakes their heads exasperatedly at him.

But other than that, admirable.

_ Jason is soft underneath his hundred pounds of solid muscle, sharp tongue, and terrible sense of morbid humour. _

Duke watches Jason with weary eyes for a long time, one of the few members of the family who seems outwardly prickly towards him at first.

“He’s just  _ like that, _ ” says Stephanie, casually painting her nails as Jason sharpens his knife up in the raftors, staring Duke directly in the eye the entire time.

It would be an off-putting experience for anyone.

But then Duke starts noticing things. Like how someone will mention being cold and the older man will sneakily leave the room for one reason or another and just  _ happen  _ across a blanket on his way back. Or how the older teen keeps a GoodReads profile and compares novels with Alfred over tea, waxing poetic about parallelism and the essence of humanity and why  _ you should read this book, Alfie, cause god dammit it’s good- _

Little things, little things, but they all add up.

When Cass gets overwhelmed at galas, Jason pulls her aside and tucks them away in some corner or another, and offers her a pen so that she can draw on his arms until she calms down, reasoning that the doodles are good conversation starters. If Cullen is retreating into himself, the man will suddenly have desperate need for a partner in crime to raid the kitchens, distracting the younger teen from his intrusive thoughts. If Dick is beating himself up about something, Jason will have a spontaneous violent urge to spar and tackle the older boy to the ground, yelling cheerful backhand compliments until the other man is laughing.

Jason hides it, that softness inside. He hides it behind curses and snide remarks and excuse after excuse after excuse.

But he can’t get past Duke. Duke sees  _ all. _

And when he’s laid up with a broken leg, absentmindedly scrolling through his phone, and receives a sudden text from an unknown number reminding him to take his pain meds-

Well. Duke smiles and reaches for the bottle of pills on his bedside table, theory confirmed.

_ Tim is a covert cuddle bug. _

Tim never initiates contact. He’ll grin, smile, offer thumbs up and send you cryptid messages of affection, but he does not initiate hugs, shoulder pats, hair ruffles, or anything else.

Duke watches him, sometimes, as the teen makes his way through life at the manor ina seemingly solitary bubble. The only real contact he consistently offers is handshakes, and that’s usually to formal business representatives at galas.

In complete obvious behavior, Tim can and will accept any initiated tactile comfort known to man, as long as you approach him head on and project your intentions clearly enough. Duke watches the boy as he leans into hugs from Dick, shoulder pats from Bruce, and full on affectionate tackles from Stephanie. If Cass wants to hold his hand during debriefing, his hand is in hers in seconds. If Harper is gritting her teeth while a particularly nasty shard of glass is pulled out of her forearm, than he’ll let her squeeze his hand in a death grip, too. 

It’s like Tim soaks it up, absorbing any positive physical contact he can, wrapping it around himself like a cloak. 

It’s subtle, as most things with Tim are. He doesn’t go looking for it, never drifts into comforting holds for too long. Just a brief moment, a soft second of  _ I’m here, you’re here, here we are together _ with closed eyes and a small smile. Only if it happens by circumstance. Only with people he trusts.

But it’s there.

And then, of course, there comes those times where Tim is asleep and not in control of any of his inhibitions.

Duke quickly learns that it creates an instant cuddle monster.

Tim can and will subconsciously curl around the nearest heat source, slumping on shoulders and using various laps as pillows for his head. He clings like a koala, if both he and his victim are horizontal, and if they’re both vertical it’s not much better.

No one is safe. No one really complains, either.

So when movie night eventually comes up again and Damian picks yet another nature documentary, and Tim suddenly droops onto Duke’s side, he doesn’t complain or really take any notice of it. He just shifts into a more comfortable position, keeps his eyes on the screen, and let’s his new brother sleep on.

_ Stephanie is ridiculously strong. _

Stephanie Brown weighs one hundred and ten pounds. She has five feet and five inches to her name. She’s one of the shortest members of the Wayne family. She’s  _ small. _

She can lift  _ ridiculous  _ amounts of weight. 

Duke sits on top of her cross legged. She is doing push ups. She is doing  _ one hundred  _ push ups. Tim dared her to, challenged her over a pickle eating contest and won, and now here they are.

Duke, the heaviest among them, is balancing tentatively on her back.

She keeps doing push ups.

_ “How are you doing this? _ ” he asks, somewhat in awe. Stephanie grunts, goes down and back up again. Cullen, to his left, is laughing in the sort of shocked way some people do when their disbelief is too strong to express in any other way.

“I weigh a hundred and twenty pounds!”

He’s looking down at her. Stephanie just makes a noncommittal sound again. Duke wonders if he’s not the only metahuman in the family after all.

Stephanie, later, laughs it off. Training, apparently, is the source of it all, and a lot of protein in her diet.

Fine, Duke is willing to let it go.

But then her strength pops up again, and again, and again. She rushes out of a burning building with five children balanced on her person. She beats one of the green lanterns in an arm wrestle. She works out with heavier weights than Damian and Tim combined.

Duke is also willing to let this go.

Except-

Except they’re at the beach, the whole family, and they’re playing out in the ocean. Dick, excitedly, calls for a chicken fight. Damian scrambles on top of Dick, Cass on top of Bruce, and Tim on top of himself. This all makes sense. This is  _ normal. _

But then Jason-  _ Jason, who is a good two hundred pounds of pure muscle-  _ clambers on top of  _ Stephanie.  _

It’s ridiculous. It’s hilarious. But, watching Damian screech as he is shoved into the water, it’s also incredibly fun.

At least, until Tim gets pulled roughly and Duke can’t compensate for it, sending them both tumbling and swallowing salt water.

Either way, Duke comes up laughing.

_ Cass will eat anything.  _

And by anything, Duke means  _ anything.  _ In great portions disproportionate to her size. At exceedingly fast rates.

Alfred will hardly have finished serving up everyone their firsts and Cass will be ready for her seconds.It doesn’t matter if she particularly enjoys the food or not, if it's vegetables or meats or dessert. 

It’s almost fascinating to watch, really, in a vague horrifyingly memorizing way. It’s like watching a vacuum, or a black hole. It’s  _ brilliant _ and kind of nauseating.

They time her, once. Set the whole thing up like a hot dog eating competition, with a bunch of Alfred’s cookies as a substitute. Dick graciously volunteers as tribute to be her competitor, a known cookie muncher and another speedy eater.

Harper acts as an announcer, declaring the rules and setting up the stopwatch. Bruce, from where he’s pretending to read a newspaper at the head of the table, snorts. Cass and Dick eye their respective pile of cookies competitively.

She finishes all twenty five of her cookies in thirty seconds. Dick, who has hardly gotten through fifteen, stares in awe at her prowess. 

No one challenges her title as speed eating queen. Damian offers her a small certificate he’d drawn as a sign of her victory.

It hangs on her wall, and every time Duke sees it, he’s reminded of just how wickedly fast the girl can be and feels a vague sense of fear and amusement all at once.

_ Damian is a great listener, when he wants to be. _

Duke’s first analysis on Damian lists him as small, angry, and eager to fight.

This… is still an accurate assessment.

But the longer he lives with the kid. The more he grows to be a trusted member of the family, the more he learns about him. About how soft and gentle he can be, about how kind. The boy is sensitive in many ways, vulnerable once you get past his hard edges, and he has a wicked sense of humour once you get past all the dry sarcasm.

He’s also, shockingly, a really good listener.

It takes the right circumstances, of course, to get to such a point where you’re talking about your problems to a twelve year old. But the kid has sharp eyes that are always looking for trouble, for danger, and when he spots someone is down he sometimes just- pulls them in. Sets them up with the guise of needing help with grooming his pets, or extra hands on an invention he’s building, or even just someone to drive him somewhere.

And then he asks vague, off hand questions until suddenly your whole life story is spilling out of your mouth without necessarily your express permission.

And Damian sits. And he listens. And he doesn’t judge- probably because he’s got his own set of terrible tragic past actions and experiences.

And it’s nice, really, if a little bit weird of a skill for a pretten to have.

Tim puts it up to the interrogation training he probably received as a kid. 

Jason cites it to that year of living with Dick.

Duke…looks at Damian and his soft and gentle calloused palms as he paints sunsets and pets his animals and aquiences to setting the table for Alfred, and thinks that Damian is just a soft kid with a soft heart that got hardened because of the life he was forced to grow up with. He thinks Damian likes listening, really. Likes being there for someone else for a change, getting a chance to help without a cause for violence.

It’s adorable. 

(But Duke doesn’t tell Damian that.)

_ Harper is a master at mimicking voices. _

Duke hardly notices it, at first. They’ll be listening to a radio or something and Harper will be muttering under her breath, following along. Or they’ll be watching a movie, or a cartoon show, a youtube video- anything. Anything that requires a voice spoken aloud. Even once or twice in the midst of Bruce’s lectures

And then, while walking down the hall, he hears it-

Barbara, laughing.

“Do Dick- do Dick again.”

And then Dick’s voice, loud and clear, if a little bit strange for a reason Duke can’t quite decipher-

_ “Hi! I’m Dick! I eat rainbows for breakfast and can and will hug you at any given moment!” _

Barbara laughs again-

_ “Batman. Please  _ tell me you can do Batman.”

Batman’s voice echoes.

_ “I am vengeance. I am the night.” _

_ “Amazing.  _ Can you do-”

Which is when Duke enters the room, befuddled because the only two people in it are Harper and Barbara.

They look at him. He looks at them.

And then, Harper, her face stretched in a mischievous grin, uses  _ his own voice  _ to ask,  _ “Are you going to stand there all day?” _

He blinks at her, eyes wide, and Barbara starts laughing all over again.

_ Cullen is a snarky little shit. _

It’s not Duke’s fault that he doesn’t notice this until  _ months  _ after the siblings join the family. When Cullen first gets there, he’s skittish. He’s shy. He doesn’t speak and he doesn’t cry and he walks around the house like he’s a ghost, only interacting with Harper in any significant way.

But that’s understandable. There’s an adjustment period, to all this, and that period looks different for everyone. Duke’s own had a hell of a lot more lashing out, confused internal screaming, and introspection, but there you go.

So yeah. Cullen’s quiet, at first. His personality almost shut down by trauma.

But now they’re here, nearly a year later, and Duke considers his life choices, trapped under a bunch of crushed debris, as the other teen snarks the  _ hell  _ out of him.

“Don’t go into the abandoned warehouse,” Cullen had told him over the comns, “It’s unstable and it will fall out from under you.”

Duke’s response had essentially boiled down to, “I’m going into the abandoned warehouse because  _ you can’t tell me what to do.” _

And he had gone into the abandoned warehouse, and it had been unstable, and it had fallen out from under him.

After the dust had settled, after a frantic check in to make sure he wasn’t seriously injured, after reassurances were given and the pile of debris categorized stable enough for now, there had been silence for a moment.

And then Cullen’s voice sounded over the comns, deadpan and deeply sarcastic.

“My,” he said, “if only someone would have warned that this would happen if you entered the unstable abandoned warehouse.”

And then-

“Oh  _ wait-” _

And Duke, feeling the vague emotional pain of siblings suffering from the  _ I told you so  _ curse everywhere, couldn’t help but laugh.

_ One Truth About Duke: _

Duke is young and growing, still finding himself in the hollows of his chest. He's fighting and brash and grieving. He's a fan of comics and cartoons, quickly growing to love musicals, and willing to sit through most anything if it makes someone he loves happy.

He is learning to love, here, all over again. Learning to love this crazy family he's stumbled into, with all their quirks and secrets and dramatics. He's learning to laugh again, and smile, and step forwards and onward with these people by his side. He's capturing them all in moments, in unearthed truths and facts and passions, and tucking them close to his heart. 

He's learning to live again, here. Second by second, moment by moment, on and on and on.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> GUYS!!
> 
> shauds MADE FANART FOR THIS CHAPTER!! Featuring amazingly strong Stephanie and Flabbergasted Duke :3
> 
> https://shauds02.tumblr.com/post/620293720539086849/january-jot-downs-chapter-19-mashpotatoequeen5


	20. don't worry (it's just a metaphor)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/20/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Bad Days Gently by Joshua Moss*
> 
> Prompt: one about Damian defending Stephanie? (Tsukiakari1203)
> 
> Warnings: Super vague allusions to bad childhoods.

Stephanie is carved out of all the things that broke once in her chest, melted and melded and brought back into the light as something new- piercing swords from rusted armour.

Steph is a woman, a child, someone brave and tired and true. She pulled herself out of the gutter, built her own soul from the ground up- and anyone who tells you otherwise is lying.

Her palms are calloused and her fingers are not fully grown, and here she is.

_ Here she is. _

She wrings herself through college, patrols in the late hours of the evening with her thesis ideas on a small notebook in her utility belt, and eventually crashes into bed in the wee hours of the morning, just to wake up and do it all again. She flips through  _ Greatest Dad Jokes of the Century  _ while visiting second hand shops and laughs at every poorly executed pun, buys odd fitting shirts and vintage jeans from tiny little holes in the walls, and the most obnoxious sunglasses known to man from a street vendor, smirking every time Tim cringes away from them during photo opps. 

Steph is loud during debates, and louder still during arguments. She’s got opinions, ideals. Truths she clings to close and carves into a heart that has never been broken but has burst, once, twice, a thousand times over the injustices of a world that does not care for its down trodden and beaten, that leaves its most disenfranchised children drowning at open sea. She;s loud, because she has been silenced and has despised it with every inch of her every being. When words do not work, she’s got two fists with hardened knuckles at the ready, and a grin that is all teeth.

She is angry, this girl, and fierce, and brilliant in all the ways her hands are still gentle and her eyes are still bright. 

Because this is also Steph, this young woman who offers hours of her life, moment after moment after moment, to a cause that swallowed her alive, once. She’s drowned in those deep dark depths, scrabbled for the light and a hand to hold and had found none.

But drowning does not mean you’re dead. It just means you can’t breathe.

And there’s a difference. There’s a  _ difference. _

Because she’s breathing now.  _ She’s breathing now _ , and with each of those breaths she strives to pull another abandoned soul from the waters.

Her knuckles are calloused, but she uses them to haul people up from over the edge, to comfort, to reach out again and again. Her soul is filled with this angry fire, but so too, is the sun, and sunlight burns and is also the source of all life on earth, also a source of warmth.

Steph has cursed and snarled and beaten and bruised, but she has also helped and soothed, smiled and sacrificed. 

Steph has fought, but she has also loved. 

Being kind in a world that is not will never be a weakness. She takes this truth and carves it into her beating, bursting heart, and soaks up days in the Spring because she is still here to do so.

She lives, and it is human, and it is good.

She does not need to justify her own existence to the world, only for herself. She is living because she is here, and that should be enough.

But here she is, dressed in a summer dress she found on a sales rack at Walmart, dark blue with creeping sunflowers spilling up one side, and the reporter to her left is leering with a wide grin that is cajoling and pitying and patronizing all at once. 

_ Justify your existence _ , the reporter demands with not so many words, the tones of a man who sees check boxes instead of people, the tones of a man who she would still save, if it came down to it.

But grinning back with a smile that is all teeth, Stephanie wonders if the man can see the danger.

He leans in closer, and her calloused knuckles curled into fists.

No, no he cannot.

But then, suddenly, she’s not so alone. 

Damian appears besides her, a polite business smile pulled fake across his face. He’s dressed in a dapper little button down and khakis, supposedly suited for this ‘casual’ brunch of sorts.

Only Gotham’s breed of socialites would consider this casual.

But there he is, this tiny boy with his determined eyes and faux smile, and Stephanie, looks at him, bewildered because she doesn’t need it- she does not need help, not with this. She has faced people questioning her existence for nearly as long as she has been alive enough to exist.

But there’s something dangerous in this little boy’s angled teeth, something being melded and carved and brought to daylight all anew, and Stephanie knows better than most that the actions you are brave enough to choose for yourself can be the hardest to take.

So she says nothing.

She says nothing as Damian scolds the reporter, something distant and angry and controlled in his tone. She says nothing as Damian does the social etiquette version of spitting on someone’s face, turning away from the man when he was mid-word and reaching to grab her by the elbow and pull her along with him. 

She says nothing on the way his hands shake.

Here is a truth that you cannot forget: we are the things we make ourselves out of the ashes. Life is a fire and it burns us alive, but we inhale and exhale the flames and we breathe and breathe and breathe.

And this is not nothing. 

Damian is young and angry and fierce. He is scrambling for handholds in a world that has offered him little but sheer cliffs, a tiny dandelion finding its survival in cracks and crevices, crawling its way out to the light.

In so many ways, his life reflects the narrative of her own sodden childhood. In so many ways, it does not.

But here is where they coincide, in these moments where they define themselves in a life that has told them they were predestined for choices they could not choose.  _ Here is where they coincide,  _ when they are gentle and kind in a world that has taught them to everything but. 

When it becomes their strength, not a weakness, not a place of shame.  _ A strength. _

Damian’s hand shake and he pulls the pair of them out of sight. It is a tell tale sign of inner turmoil, a break of ironclad composure in the face of expressing vulnerability, in expressing some form of care.

It is not easy. It will never be easy, to shed those false truths carved into young and narrow shoulders, scars and hollowed spaced meant to be grown around until they swallow you up alive. It will never be easy to fill the shaking empty pieces of themselves up with something more than hate and bitterness.

But here they are.

Stephanie does not need her existence to be justified by anyone but herself, but seeing the way Damian’s eyes spark is something reassuring in and of itself, a silent reassurance of  _ you are here, you are here, you are here. _

They are building themselves up here, in this moment. They are swallowing air and washing out the aching parts of their soul. They are breathing and living, hauling themselves out of the water, building themselves a boat, and sailing somewhere far away where their pasts cannot touch them.

Stephanie grabs Damian’s hands, this boy not grown, and holds them tight for one second, two. There are a thousand words that can be spoken, and she lets them all fall away unsaid.

Her gentle calloused hands are made to hold: they do all the talking for her.

_ You are here, you are here, you are here… _

_ And it is good. _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ~~~The metaphors got away from me guys. Whelp.~~~


	21. we'll toast what could have been (my dearly departed)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/21/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Dearly Departed, by Marianas Trench*
> 
> PROMPT: would ever be willing to do a short story about claire clover aka gotham girl? Thanks (Tsukiakari1203)
> 
> WARNINGS: Grief/Mourning and mentioned character death. Also, main character has super powers that come of her own life source whenever she uses them.

Here’s a truth: life is what you make it, but it also what it is. You are born into this world kicking and screaming, a cry for help in a world that is all too often hostile, a cry for love.

Most people get it, this love, and they carry it with them for the rest of their days. They pass it on, they mould it, they shape it into their very beings and grow around it. They cradle that love close to their chest, and for good reason, because love is why we keep on living.

But love- fragile, tenacious, terrible ongoing love- even with all its power and all its strength and raging aching secrets, cannot save you from the greatest tragedies of being alive. It cannot save you from pain, the way it shatters your soul and carves you wide open. It cannot save you from natural disasters, from war, from economic crisis. 

It cannot save you from death, nor your loved ones.

Claire thinks about life often. She thinks about it all the time. Her years on this earth are few in number, but she wouldn’t consider herself young. Youth is for people who feel they have years ahead of them. Youth is for people who feel they are destined to be alive.

But Claire has these powers in her chest and her life carried in her own two palms. She could live, she supposes, for any number of years. But she knows just as well that at any moment she could choose to become a god, could walk a mere few mortal hours and then disintegrate into nothing.

After all, she’s seen it happen.

Her brother had been human. Her brother had been a god. He had walked this earth and he had been sarcastic and supportive and ridiculous in every way. He had been  _ hers _ , and with all the powers in the world she could not have saved him.

He was driven mad. He walked the line of light and dark and he tripped and he stumbled and got swallowed by the shadows. And there was  _ nothing  _ she could have done to save him.

And yet-

She mourns. She rages. She shaves her head and dons a costume and saves lives recklessly, carelessly with powers that drain her of her life with every use, because she doesn't know what else to do with herself.

You do not have to consider yourself young to feel lost.

And Claire is lost, here. She is drowning in her own existence, untethered from the rest of the world, drifting farther and farther from safe harbour. The world does not care that her grief hangs from her shoulders like a phantom limb, that everyone she has ever loved has been taken by life’s greatest tragedy.  _ The world does not care.  _

And yet she fights. She breathes. She speaks to her dead and reaches out, again and again and again. She weeps. She mourns. She snarls and throws fists and  _ tries,  _ again and again and again. Because her brother would have wanted her too. Because she wants to live, even now, even when everything has fallen apart. Because she wants to love and be loved in turn.

He messed up. She’s  _ messing  _ up. She’s got a gift she bargained for with her own soul and she cannot even appreciate the use of it. 

_ Do you like your life?  _ She had asked Batman, once. She was not sure what she was looking for. An answer, maybe, to all the creaking aching parts in her chest that have never felt like youth. An explanation for a world that does not care. Some advice.

She doesn’t know.

But she knows she doesn’t want to be the person who exists without caring. Who exists and does not care for it. She wants to be here, to  _ truly be here,  _ whatever comes next. She wants to yearn, to live, to love with everything she’s got so fiercely it is its very own supernova, incomprehensible and brilliant and here and here and here.

She has these powers in her chest and she could be a god. And yet here she is, still walking on earth.

Claire thinks about love all the time. About how it makes you alive.

(You are born into this world kicking and screaming, a cry for help in a world that is all too often hostile, a cry for love. Well, here she is, still striving.)

Because love is human, in its deepest parts. Petty and selfish and aching. Beautiful, mesmerizing, beyond words. Tragic, in some ways, joyous in others. 

Fallible in everything. We humans are so very capable of making mistakes, of ripping things apart with our bare hands and sticking to our ways because the world outside is too frightful. This is a truth carved into our genetic code and it does not stop just because we have loved and been loved and will love forever.

Love doesn’t stop us from being human. It does not stop us from  _ making mistakes. _

It just makes us capable of growing from them. 

Unless, of course, life kills you first.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I've never written or even heard of this human before, so I hope I did her justice <3


	22. when everything feels heavy (i've learned to travel light)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/22/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Sleeping At Last, Seven*
> 
> PROMPT: If you're still after prompts I'm always a sucker for big bro Jason helping out the little birdies and attempting to act like he doesn't care when he very much does. So maybe if Tim the poor bab is being a depresso espresso and for some reason or other is holed up in his room overworkimg himself as usual, what if Jason decides that he needs a vacation (whether he wants it or not) and promptly kidnaps him into an impromptu road trip with guest star Roy Harper (cause my man he also needs more love) [Tapple]
> 
> WARNINGS: Allusions to depression. Antidepressants. 
> 
> *going to be adding more to this chapter my bois.

Tim wakes up to the fibers of a cheap blanket tickling his nose, curled up in the backseat of a car.

This, in and of itself, is concerning, because his last memories distinctly included himself wallowing in his own bed, no vehicle nearby to speak of.

It is also rather concerning that the car is  _ moving. _

Tim wants to scream. Wants to throw his hands up in annoyance. He’s too tired to put up with another kidnapping attempt. He’s too tired to put up with anything at all.

And yet, here he is. His body hollowing from the inside out, his chest an empty aching thing that takes and takes and takes-  _ and here he is. _

He purposely doesn’t move and keeps his breathing smooth and even, mimics unconsciousness and tries to take stock of the situation, because he’s got people waiting back home for him and no matter how exhausting existence is he has every intention of living till tomorrow.

And then he hears a voice. A familiar, scratchy voice.

“Hey, Jay. Jay- I think the kid’s awake.”

Tim groans, slits open one eye to take in Roy’s ragged appearance leaning in a fraction too close, the way the man’s smile quirks up in the corners.

“Hey, Timbo,” the redhead says, and Jason glances at him briefly through the rear view mirror. There’s some upbeat songs playing on the sound system, and both of the older boys are wearing clothes meant for travelling.

Tim’s still in his pajamas.

He smacks his lips, mouth dry, and croaks without moving at all. “Not a kid. And don’t call me Timbo.”

Then he closes his eyes. There. Two whole sentences. Achievement. Human interaction quota fulfilled for the day.

Except-

Except he still doesn’t know why, or even how, he’s in this car driving off to who the hell knows where, and that seems like kind of important information.

So he sighs, keeps his eyes closed, and asks quietly, “What am I doing here?”

Jason hums up front, swears at a passing driver, and honks his horn.

And then-

“Well, you hadn’t left your room in three days and good ol’ Brucie was getting kind of desperate. Thus, we decided to kidnap you and bring you on a life-changing adventure and all that jazz. We’re going total  _ Zuko  _ on this.”

“How’d I get in the car?”

Honking horns and another tarade of road rage. Jason curses loudly, Roy laughs, and Tim stays still.

“I switched out your coffee for decaf.”

The younger boy frowns, because that makes no sense, wouldn’t account for how the hell Jason seemingly lifted him up in his sleep and slipped him into his car without him waking up-

“Also, we drugged it.”

Ah. That makes sense. Okay, okay.

He doesn’t say anything else.

Up front, he hears Roy murmur, “Man, I see what you mean. It’s like he’s only half here-” The dead man walking makes a quiet affirming noise, shifts, his voice filtering through in intelligible waves.

Tim’s not paying attention. He curls around the hollow spaces within his chest and lays heavy and aching and here and here and here.

Time passes in moments that last eternities, self contained universes that he sleeps through and lets pass over him. Jason and Roy sing loudly in the front seat- both of them surprisingly in tune- alongside the Shrek musical. Outside the windows, the world rushes past unseen.

They stop once, twice. Three times. Stretch their legs and stock up on snacks. Bathroom breaks and brief tussles between two boys who are living on a high of being alive and young.

Tim doesn’t participate, much, focuses his attention on the back of the driver’s seat and traces the patterns of the upholstery. But Jason flicks water on his face until he takes the bottle from him, grumbling all the while, and Roy shoves a packet of saltines into his hands with a smirk that is belied by the kindness in his eyes.

He doesn’t participate, but he nibbles on crackers and drinks small sips of water, watches as the two older men vanish into gas stations with a cheery tinkle of a bell and rough shoves back and forth, loud and unforgiving and here.

Watching them makes him wonder when he started apologizing for his own existence. Watching them makes him realize he doesn’t really know, and is struggling to care. 

They drive. The outskirts of Gotham vanish into long strips of farmland, and from that into small towns and road-side attractions. The highway stretched on in front of them forever, and Jason drives.

They finally come to a stop at a motel in the middle of nowhere, run down and shabby but somehow still standing. They unpile from the car with gangly limbs numb from sitting too long, Roy and Jason laughing and Tim quiet and subdued between them.

“Grab your bag, Timbo. They’re supposed to be this really fantastic Mexican place around here and I, for one, am  _ starving.” _

Tim doesn’t laugh at Roy’s dorky grin. Ponders on issuing another complaint about being called Timbo and decides against it, knowing that the words would be ignored anyways.

He finds his old duffle bag in the trunk, hastily stuffed with goods from his room in a lumpy mass. There are pins on the bag he doesn’t even remember getting, lighting up the fabric with a once-there personality he feels has been washed away and replaced by a dull grey mass.

They check in, head up to the room they’ll be taking residence for the night in, and the older boys head out to go and get dinner. Jason invites him to come along, and he refuses by not replying, curling into his single bed immediately upon entering their temporary lodgings. 

He hears a sigh, feels the way his estranged brother reaches for him and pulls away without making contact, and keeps his eyes closed as the doors closed.

For the first time in over eight hours, he’s alone.

Slowly, carefully, he lifts himself up. The motel room is eerily quiet with the sudden absence of two other bodies, but Tim ignores it. Stretches, takes the time to check what’s been packed for him. Basic clothes- along with a spare coat and some hiking boots- a couple of books he recognizes as the ones that were sitting unread on his bedside table. There’s a half-filled book of logic puzzles, a couple of erasable pens.. His meds are tucked into a side pocket, and a thing of thinking putty. 

His old camera is there, too. Tim opens the case and peeks at it, this piece of film and metal that once was his entire world. It seems small, now.

No phone. No electronics. No access to case files or the world wide web.

Tim breathes with hollowed lungs. He makes it work.

Efficiently, he folds everything into neat little piles and stacks it back into his bag in a much more organized fashion. Then he walks around the room and checks for bugs and hidden cameras, an ingrained instinct he stumbles through instinctively. Then he takes a shower, because he’s gross, and if the road trip goes on much longer he doesn’t want to subject his travel companions to the smell.

He swallows his antidepressants dry.

Then he curls back under the covers, and even though it’s what he’s done all day- he sleeps.

Except-

Except suddenly someone is hanging above him, snapping his fingers under his nose.

“Tim. Tim. Tim. Tim. Tim. Tim. Tim-”

_ “What?” _

Jason smirks.

“Wake up. We’ve got dinner.”

He pulls his blankets over his head. 

“Not hungry.”

Jason’s not having it.

The man yanks at the comforter and throws it behind him with a flourish, ignoring how Tim looks up at him with exhausted incomprehensible eyes. He own dark obs take on a mischievous glint as he takes on an offended, jaunty tone.

_ “Too bad. _ Your father and I work hard to get food on the table. We walked a whole fifteen minutes, I’ll have you know. You should show some respect. Isn’t that right, dear?”

Roy looks up from where he’s already got his face half stuffed with burrito and nods decisively. “Human offspring, listen to your mother.”

Rolling his eyes, Tim slowly sits up and swings his legs over the side of the bed.

“You do recognize that both of you are like- hardly older than me, right? There is no feasible way I could be your biological offspring.”

A burrito being shoved in his face is his only answer, and he gets a smear of beans across his cheek and Jason’s full bodied laughter.

It is not the worst way to spend an evening.

They leave bright and early. Tim swallows antidepressants and double checks the room to make sure nothing is left behind. Roy shoves all the free toiletries into his pockets. Jason gets behind the drivers seat even as he bemoans how “their relationship is falling apart” because Roy “never makes any commitment” and the other man laughs around a mouthful of dry cereal.

Tim hides his ghost of a smile by looking out the window. Pressing his hands so hard against the side of his door they turn white, he tries to feel the vibrations of the engine, tries to plant himself in this moment and make it never end. 

A steady thrum runs through his fingers.  _ You are here,  _ it says,  _ you are here. _

And Tim breathes with hollow lungs.

They drive, and the world passes by, and this time Tim is here to see it.

There’s a watered down emotion sitting in his chest, along with a dozen other he can’t decipher. It’s not surprising: Tim’s feelings have been coming up pale and empty for months now. If anything, strong expressions of anything would be the real shocker.

Besides him is his camera case, which he had impulsively pulled from his bag last minute. He doesn’t touch it, just lets it sit there, listens as Roy and Jason talk, offers one word responses when they try to pull him into conversations.

His words are limited, today. He can feel it. They gather in his throat in a jumbled mess, one he can not take out and organize and stack neat once he’s done. To speak is to detangle an entire mass, and he has little energy for it.

But he’s upright, and that’s got to be something. There is a world outside his window and they are both still here, even if he is hollowed out and aching, and that has to be has to be  _ something. _

Still, when they finally stop again at a gas station Tim has no intentions of getting out and joining the fray. Jason, when he hears this, frowns mightily and scrutinizes him, looking for something he cannot seem to name.

And then his older brother, in typical brother fashion, comes around to his door and physically pulls him out of the car, dropping him right then and there onto the dirty concrete, seemingly unconcerned for the fact that Tim only has a pair of socks on and they’re parked smack dab in the middle of a puddle.

He looks down at his wet feet. He looks back up at Jason. Says, without emotion, “I hate you. So much.”

He gets a hair ruffle for his efforts.

“Grab your shoes. You need to pull your weight and snack rotation has to fall on  _ somebody.” _

So Tim gets added to the snack rotation. He grabs nuts and chips and chocolate milk, because why the hell not, and then pauses to deliberate on what Oreos he should pick.

He takes too long. Roy and Jason appear by his sides and immediately fall into a hushed debate.

“Listen, if you think that anything beats a classic Oreo cookie, then I’m sorry, but I’m divorcing you-”

“The mint ones are actually better in practically every way, Jay, and you’re a fool not to realize it-”

“How  _ dare  _ you-”

Tim, whose socks are still sopping wet and who is surprisingly experiencing a watered-down sensation of petty revenge, sorts out the tangled words as best he can and cuts in.

“Mint. I vote mint.”

Jason lets loose a betrayed gasp of betrayal. Roy beams, swinging an arm around his shoulders and pulling him against his much larger frame. 

_ “Tim _ obviously recognizes the superior cookie. In the dovorce, he’s coming with  _ me.  _ Two against one, so let’s-”

“Who said this was a democracy? I never agreed to a democracy!”

The debate continues.

In the end, they end up getting both.

Tim watches the sky as it brightens and darkens throughout the day. Follows the routes of the highway and distantly calculates their possible destinations. Music plays on the radio, loud and varied and talked over whenever a conversation starter finds it way out of Jason or Roy’s mouth.

He doesn’t participate, but he listens. He exists.

And that night they go camping by a lake, tents taking far too long to hitch up considering they were three thoroughly trained vigilantes, but he supposes that’s just how it goes sometimes.

They build a campfire. Jason makes a dare and Roy immediately takes it, splashing into the freezing water and regretting it profusely on the way out, teeth chattering and toes numb.

Jason laughs. Tim doesn’t. But there’s watered down humour in his chest and that is not nothing.

They roast hot dogs and then make s’mores. Chatter echoes through the clearing and Tim curls up under the ragged blanket he’s becoming to think as his own and watches the sparks crackle up from the flames, imagines them floating up and becoming stars in the night sky.

And they’re sitting there together, moments lasting forever in their self contained universes, and Tim breathes hollowed air and doesn’t even think about it before he reaches for his camera. Roy and Jason are laughing across from him, the firelight casting their faces with a warm hue, and the lake shimmering with the dancing constellations.

He snaps a picture.

The two older men freeze, turning on him. Tim lowers his camera and ignores the way his ears turn red in embarrassment, packing it back away.

“Should we pose next time? I’ve been informed by multiple reliable sources that I’ve got a  _ killer  _ bod.”

Jason is grinning at him, eyes happy and sharp and brilliant. Roy is laughing, nudging shoulders, asking to see the photo-

And Tim hides his smile and feels something a little more than the grey aftertones of what once might have been. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyone have a favourite kind of oreo? there are so many in america and i don't know which ones are worth trying


	23. each little species (in its little way can teach me)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/23/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Bird, by Terrance Williams Jr. and Thomas Sanders.*
> 
> PROMPTS: Damian shows how much he loves his family by getting them all pets. And when I say pets I mean magical / alien beasts ala Goliath. (The+Sneak)  
> One of the fam (I imagine Damian but really any of them would work fine) brings home an animal or pet. Then all the rest of them start doing the same and pretty soon the manor just becomes a veritable zoo. (Forestfire34720)
> 
> WARNINGS: None. :)

It starts like this:

They are sitting on an overhang overlooking Metropolis, Jon is going on and on about a bunch of gifts he’s making for his parents and grandparents because family day is coming up and he wants to express his affection and his gratitude for taking care of him.

Damian’s not really paying attention, letting the words slide over him in a far away haze, trying to calculate how he would get down from off of their chosen skyscraper without his grapple. He’d probably dislocate his shoulder, but he thinks he could do it.

Grayson would be proud.

And that thought… lingers. In the back of his mind. Like a little ball of twine to be slowly unspooled. And Jon is still talking about family and love and gifts of gratitude, and Damian is still half listening, and the words intertwine with the thread in his head and Grayson has done an awful lot for him, hasn’t he? He has, he has-

Two hours later, Jon finally flings himself into the air with a yawn, citing how he’s not made for the nightlife, and flies home. Damian _tt’_ s on principal and then grapples away to the nearest Zeta Tube, back to Gotham and it’s familiar darkness, and its penchant for crime to be squandered.

Good- he’s itching for a fight.

Gotham doesn’t disappoint: three hours after the fact, Damian is breathing hard after a rough battle with some sort of magic user. Those ridiculous fuzzy thoughts are still untwining in his head, and he quickly cuffs the sorcerer and rolls them into the recovery position, paging the GCPD and then finally taking stock of what remains from the battle field.

It’s a… mess. A very big mess. The magic user had been an amateur but a powerful one, with an apparent taste for glitter bombs. There are sparkles in places where no sparkles should be- including his suit. 

It’s _awful._

And yet, he ponders while surveying the scene, eyes latching onto the animal the sorcerer had been casting spells on in his plot for world domination, thoughts of Grayson and gratitude still resounding, he supposes there might be a bright side for the entire situation after all. 

  
  


Dick Grayson wakes up with a heavy presence on his chest. 

This is not necessarily uncomfortable, or even particularly alarming: his siblings are prone to sneaking in during the night for any manner of things, be it nightmares or intruding thoughts or just the fact that he happens to have the most pillows at the moment. 

So yes, waking to cuddles isn’t particularly disturbing.

Except-

Except none of his siblings are this heavy, and none of them are _slimy._

He opens his eyes.

There’s a monster sleeping on his chest.

A monster, sort of reminiscent of a giant squid- but it’s surrounded by a blue-green glow and has about twenty extra tentacles. 

Also, it is snoring with the approximate sound of a tractor engine

Dick breathes, slowly, carefully. Damian, the other night, had mentioned a “surprise” for him. He has a sneaking suspicion that he’s just found out just what said surprise was.

He wishes he could say he was more shocked. Or even disturbed. But he’s sort of just resigned to the entire thing.

The creature rumbles, opens one massive luminescent eye.

He clears his throat.

“Hallo.”

Some sort of unearthly screech echoes in response. Dick assumes that it’s a kind of greeting.

“I think I’ll call you Betsy.”

A happy chitter, and a slimy tentacle thwaps lovingly across his face. Bruce is going to kill him. This entire situation is ridiculous.

Dick is…. Growing attached.

It takes some effort to explain that he actually _does_ need to get up and interact with the wider world, and can’t just stay cuddling all day. But once Betsy understands, it floats up and into the air readily enough, following after him like an eager puppy dog and making about just as much mess.

He goes to find Damian.

Damian, who admires the creature like one might admire a particularly well brought up show horse, and says, “She’s _beautiful,_ isn’t she?”

There are many responses that one can give to their pint sized assassin brother bringing home a monster and gifting them to you as a pet. Screams of horror. Weeping. Chatisizing and lectures and a panicked rant about safety and rules and _logic._

 _Dami,_ Dick should say, _you can’t just bring home every abandoned animal you see. Especially if it’s magical. Especially especially if it’s magical and HUGE._

But Damian has that tiny little smirk that means he’s superbly pleased with himself, that means he’s happy and he thinks he’s done something _good,_ and the older man looks at him and _can’t._

So instead he sighs, grins, and ruffles his baby brother’s hair.

“Yeah, she really is. Thank you so much for getting me her!”

The younger boy looks down at his feet, hiding his smile, and reaches up to pet an offered tentacle. 

Dick watches with a content expression, but inside he’s screaming.

_Bruce is going to completely, utterly kill him._

Betty takes up residence in the Batcave’s underground lake, swimming among the various water-equated vehicles and happily chirring and splashing around. She has an affinity for bananas, but no apparent need to eat. 

Bruce grumbles about it. Bruce scowls and glowers and grimaces. He argues and tells Damian off. Damian looks actively offended and argues right back, stating Betty is an _excellent_ source of protection for the cave a new member of the family, like it or not.

Bruce looks at Dick with a face that clearly expresses _why have you raised my son to be like this?_

Dick shoots back a face that says _he gets all his ‘adopt every stray in sight’ tendencies from you, old man, don’t look at me._

Damian, who thinks they’re both not paying attention, pets Betty’s giant bulbous head and coos very softly at her.

Dick looks at Bruce, gestures silently. _It makes him happy!_

Bruce glares all the harder but finally aquiences.

If he knew what would happen next, he definitely wouldn’t have.

Duke appears in the entryway of the sitting room, face confused and excited.

“How come,” he demands, “no one ever told me about the giant squid!”

Cass, who stands beside her brother, nods firmly and points accusingly around the room.

Raising his hand from where he’s happily watching cartoons on the couch, Dick gestures vaguely and then turns his beaming grin towards his youngest brother _(who is there by force, really, he has no interest in Danny Phantom’s exploits, not at all),_ who scowls and squirms in response.

“She’s a new addition, actually. Damian got her for me to express all his undying brotherly affections.”

“Did _not,”_ says Damian, having obviously done just so.

 _“Awww,”_ Dick croons, and the younger boy decides that this is enough motive to take action, growling and swiping at his brother’s face.

_“Shut up.”_

But their conversation is interrupted when Duke and Cass are suddenly up in their space, mock reproving frowns pulling at their lips. 

“Wait, wait, wait- you’re telling me that you got _Dick_ an animal friend and not _me_ or Cass? I thought we had a connection!”

Cass shakes her head somberly besides him. Duke, ignoring her, continues his tirade.

“Foreshame, Damian, foreshame.”

Dick laughs, because it’s clear the entire thing is silly, an exaggerated response to deal with a sort of crazy situation, and soon enough the others are laughing with him. There’s a giant squid named Betty in their underground lake, reminiscent of something straight out of Hogwarts. Who wouldn’t laugh?

Damian. Damian wouldn’t laugh.

Instead, unnoticed, Damian is looking at the two young teens in front of him with an appraising eye, and a plan begins to form in his head.

Two weeks later, and they’re finally getting used to having Betty in the cave’s reservoir. In the early morning she sometimes sings a warbling sort of lullaby, flabby translucent skin pulsating magical rainbow lights across the ceiling. At night she often creeps out to moonbathe, frolicking in open waters. 

Dick often visits when he’s got a spare moment, talking about his day and slipping into the cold lake for a brief swim. Otherwise, she spontaneously decides to float up and around the cave, greeting everyone she comes across with sloppy tentacle hugs and taking proffered bananas in her wake. 

It absolutely _terrifies_ Jason the first time he comes across her, having no idea of the family’s new resident monster. Everyone learns some new curse words, along with the surprisingly high pitch the teen can reach when he’s startled enough.

Tim laughs out loud. It was a good time to be had at all.

But other than that, things are settling down.

Except-

Except that Cass comes riding down the stairs one day and she is riding an actual _god forsaken unicorn_.

This is no gentle beast from story books. It’s at least eight feet tall, coal black and eyes wickedly intelligent, and horn spiraling from its forehead with the general air one might relate to a two foot long sword.

Cass giggles, waves, swing sher bare feet back and forth. 

Jason, who is standing in the parlour, nearly drops his toast.

 _“How?”_ he asks, completely bamboozled.

“Damian!” she calls, and nudges the creature to trot off to the kitchen, where Alfred is about to learn that the creature is carnivorous.

Strawberries are seemingly rejected on principle. The still defrosting turkey he was planning on preparing for dinner that night is no longer on the menu.

Jason follows after with a blank look of shock, veering wide around the powerful hind legs. His eyes are nearly twice the size they are supposed to be.

“Bruce is going to be so _pissed.”_

And then, because Jason is a petty asshole who takes great joy when Bruce is pissed, grins.

“What’s his name?”

Cass hums happily. Swings her feet back and forth, back and forth. The unicorn snorts softly and takes another massive bite of raw meat while Alfred watches on with an expression that speaks of great exasperation and polite dissaproval.

And then, because Cass is also a tiny little asshole, she decides.

“Horse,” she declares. “His name is Horse.”

Jason laughs. _This_ is why she’s his favourite.

Harper, who has just woken up, walks downstairs, sees the creature taking up most of the kitchen space, and immediately turns around and goes back to bed.

She doesn’t want to know.

Bruce is indeed pissed. However, he is even more pissed upon finding Damian, Cullen, and Duke outside in the yard among the tree line, where Duke is being crowded by no less than five strange… things.

“Damian,” Bruce says with a sense of calm sanity that has left him years ago, “What are you doing?”

Damian looks up at him, eyes bright and completely disregarding the look on Bruce’s face, which is a near mirror image of the one Alfred had been making. 

They are done, these two men. So very done.

And yet-

Duke laughs.

“Damian got me little alien rhinos. Oh my _gods,_ Bruce, please say I can keep them. I can keep them, right? You’re going to let me keep them?”

They do look like rhinos, he supposes. Rhinos who have been shrunk to the size of a large dog, with pudgy little legs and large snuffling nostrils. They’re also the little fact that they’re composed entirely out of some weird sort of plant, like a bunch of bushes got up and just decided to be sentient one day.

One of them is blossoming bright yellow flowers. It knocks against Cullen’s knee, begging for more scratches. His newest adoptee leans down to let the creature swipe it’s tongue against his palm.

Duke detangles himself from the pile, catches Bruce’s expression.

Bruce stares at Duke. Duke stares at Bruce, eyes widening into a pout.

Bruce laments the day Dick learned how useless he was at deflecting puppy dog eyes, because he just _knows_ that his eldest is holding training sessions and coaching his younger siblings in everything he’s learned.

He can picture it now: _Wrapping Bruce Around Your little Finger 101._ With how many kids he has, it’s probably a popular course.

But no, _no,_ Bruce is going to stay strong, this time. He let Betty stay. He let all of Damian’s little cats and dogs stay. He let _Batcow_ stay. There has to be a limit: his house is not going to become a zoo, not under his watch.

He opens his mouth-

“Okay,” he mouth says without getting proper referral from his brain, because it’s a _traitor_ , “but you have to clean up after any messes they make.”

Duke cheers, high fiving a bemused Damian and immediately getting dogpiled by a bunch of cuddly rhino alien creatures. They’re like _corgis,_ Bruce thinks in the distant thoughts of a dramatic man in deep despair, _little rhino corgis from outer space._

Laying on the ground, dogpiled by his new pets, Duke closes his eyes and smiles happily.

“This is the best day of my life, oh my gods.”

Damian, who is feeling very successful, hides his pleased grin by turning and waving at Cass, who is racing across the grounds on her dangerous meat-eating unicorn of doom, cackling gleefully as Jason and Dick sprint after her.

Bruce sighs, pinches the bridge of his nose, and sighs.

Hopefully, this whole thing will blow over soon.

It doesn’t.

Horse takes up residence among the woods, and Cass goes out riding nearly every day. Stephanie, whenever she stops by, insists on trying to do the same thing and falls off nearly every time: riding without a saddle or reins is _hard._ She keeps at it, though, determined. Horse… tolerates her, makes the whole thing into a game.

He also likes to find it’s way down into the cave and play with Betty, who is big enough to not get hurt in any rough housing. 

Sniggles, Piggles, Wiggles, Jiggles, and Frank (they ran out of good sounding _iggle_ names) happily wander around the forest, munching on low hanging greens and filling up the occasional clearings with massive alien flora that grow, mature, and die within twenty four hours.

Tim goes out with Duke and takes notes on them trying to determine their properties. Duke distracts the corgi rhinos and feeds them frozen peanut butter flavoured oreos, because it’s the only thing they’ll eat outside of the yellow flowers that Tim is so insistent on figuring out, and they can get pretty territorial.

And this is fine, obviously. Life goes on at Wayne Manor. Bad guys are fought, movies are watched, the world is saved once or twice and someone eats all the animal crackers, resulting in war among the children that lasts approximately a week.

(It was Alfred. Alfred ate the animal crackers. Not that he’ll ever tell.)

Normalcy is relative, but they find it somewhere between giant floating squids and carnivorous unicorns and sentient plant creatures. It’s natural, at this point.

And then Jason comes home one day, and he’s not alone.

Bruce stares at the creature. The creature huffs at him, waves it long tail back and forth.

He would describe it as looking as a wolf, but wolves don’t have six legs. They’re not made out of ethereal lights sewn together in overlapping waves, either. And they don’t _hum_.

“What is this this,” says Bruce, deadpan.

Jason smirks. Jason is an asshole.

“His name is Macduff,” says his second eldest son, “and I love him.”

This… does not answer his question.

“You can’t keep him here. Jay-”

But there’s an offended squak, and Jason points with a dramatic air pulls out his trump card.

“But you let Dick and Duke and Damian and Cass keep _their_ animals!”

 _“What.”_

The word comes out of Bruce’s mouth. It is not a question but a statement of his general befuddlement. 

Jason continues on, pointing all the more pointedly.

“If you don’t let me keep _mine_ then it’s _favouritism!”_

Bruce breathes fast and hard through his nose, opens his mouth to refute-

And then Betty is upon him, wrapping around his torso with a happy croon and slimy tentacles.

All the fight leaves him.

“Fine,” he says, “fine.” And he is so, so done.

Are all children like this? Or just his own?

Bruce doesn’t know. Bruce sighs, accepts his fate, and walks away, giant floating squid still blithely clinging to his back.

Because this, apparently, is his life now.

Life goes on. So does the process of slowly making Wayne Manor a zoo.

“At least it’s not magical,” Tim is saying, already on the defensive, though his eyes are sharp and his shoulders are purposefully casual. 

Bruce looks at him. Looks at the small creature being held out in his son’s palms.

The tiny hedgehog looks up at him and squeaks. 

Sighing deeply, Bruce asks the question that lingers in the open air between them.

“I’ll grant you that. But- _why,_ Tim? Why do you want a hedgehog?”

Tim shrugs, pulls his new animal friend close.

When he speaks, his words are deceptively casual.

“I mean, everyone else is doing it.”

Bruce narrows his eyes.

“Stephanie talked you into this, didn’t she.”

It wasn’t a question. Batman doesn’t _do_ questions. He’s Batman.

Tim’s lips quirk into a smile.

“No comment.”

Another little squeak from the hedgehog, and Tim’s little grin brightens instinctively. 

And Bruce… gives in. He’s a sucker for making his kids happy, no matter how hard he tries to hide it.

“What’s his name?”

Tim curls a finger around the little creature’s tummy.

“Spock,” he says. Because of course it is.

 _Of course_ it is.

Bruce isn’t sure why he expected anything less.

They build a cage for Spock up in Tim’s room, put the whole thing together with an elaborate play set of everything a hedgehog could ever want or need.

And then, because everyone kept insisting on bringing her downstairs so they could hold her while going through case files and such, Spock also got a cage down in the batcave.

Macduff has a particular affinity for her, and a tiny hedgehog balancing on the head of an ethereal six-legged wolf creature becomes a common sight.

On his good days, Bruce can admit that it’s very cute.

Of course, this is where things truly start to spiral, as all things do when it comes to the Waynes.

Harper and Cullen corner him in his study, the young woman defiant and her brother expectant.

“Why don’t _we_ get any pets? Huh, Bruce? Is this a status thing? Is it because we’re new and thus unloved?”

There’s a glint in her eye that says she’s teasing. But there’s also something in the way they hold themselves that says _want,_ and Bruce sighs the bone deep sigh of a man who knows he’s gone off the deep end and stands up.

“Grab your coats,” he tells them, and they cheer and run off.

He grumbles all the way down to the garage, murmuring how his house is _“not a zoo”_ and how his kids _“are crazy, the whole lot of them, crazy-”_

But when Cullen scrambles into the front seat, beaming and excited, Bruce isn’t complaining, just reaches out to ruffle his kid’s hair.

“Thanks, B, really. I’ve always wanted a pet.”

And how can the man ever refute such soft sincere words?

Harper sprawls into the back seat.

_“Let’s go! Let’s go let’s go let’s goooo-”_

Bruce puts the key in the engine, and then they’re off.

Harper picks out a dog. A massive dog that comes up to her hips and has more energy than should probably be allowed. A massive dog with an _extensive_ amount of fur. Alfred is going to be so pissed. Why did Bruce _ever agree to this?_

But she _loves_ it though, letting it slobber all over her face the entire way home, petting and cooing at it with every opportunity.

“I shall call you Chewbarka and Chewbarka you shall.”

Newly named Chewbarka barks happily. Harper laughs. Bruce feels something warm bubble up in his chest while looking at her through the rearview mirror, and internally plans his defense to Alfred when it comes to cleaning up all the dog hair that will inevitably get everywhere around the house.

Cullen chose a golden coloured rabbit with long velvet ears and a tiny button nose. It sits in a box on his lap, and he smiles something soft and fond every time his eyes revert back to it. 

“Name?” Bruce asks.

Carter hums, taps his knee.

“Apollo, I think.” 

Bruce coughs awkwardly. Hums. 

“Very good,” he says, and he means it.

It only escalates from there. Because that’s what these things tend to do.

Clark walks in from the zeta tubes, freezes at the sight of the cave. There are massive yellow flowers extending from the earth, and random piles of brushes, food bowls, and tracked in mud.

Bruce, deep bags under his eyes and a weight to his shoulders that suggests the years of a much older man, says, “Sorry about the mess. We brought everyone in last night because of the storm.”

And then quieter, under his breath, “even the corgis. Why did Duke insist we bring in the corgis? They _like_ the rain.”

Clark, who finds the benefit of super hearing to be superbly helpful when it came to Bruce and his ways, hears this.

His brain to mouth filter has never been the best.

“Wait- you have corgis?”

The tired man nods, waves absentmindedly to the alien looking flora. Clark blinks, peers closer, and then-

A small herd of what look like tiny green _rhinoceroses_ burst out and file deeper into the cave.

The super blinks, bewildered, turns to look at Bruce.

The human nods sloemnly.

“Corgis.”

And then he turns and walks on, deeper into the madhouse that is now his life.

Clark follows. He thinks he sees a long glowing tentacle recede back into the underground lake. He thinks he sees a unicorn on a bunch of ground beef, glaring reproachfully at him. He thinks he sees a luminescent wolf pass by with a hedgehog on its head and a rabbit on its back, a large shaggy dog happily trotting beside it. 

He thinks.

And then Bruce is suddenly ducking, and Clark gets a face full of sharp talons.

Luckily, he is invulnerable. Otherwise an emergency hospital visit would be in his near future. 

As is, the kryptonian hardly breaks his stride, and watches in a sort of astounded awe and a massive honest to god _phoenix_ lets loose an ear-piercing screech and flies back into the air, tendrils of flame chasing its tail feathers.

Bruce sighs.

“Sorry about that.”

And then, at a much louder level-

 _“STEPHANIE! I THOUGHT WE TALKED ABOUT THIS! KEVIN NEEDS TO BE TRAINED OUT OF ATTACKING EVERYONE ON SIGHT._ ”

Stephanie’s voice echoes back from farther in the cave system.

“SORRY BRUCE! WON’T HAPPEN AGAIN! PROMISE!”

The human sighs.

“She always says that.”

Clark looks at him with wide eyes.

And then he closes them, and _listens._

There are alien-sounding grunts echoing from all around. A deep bark, a monkey’s chitter and a kitten’s meow, paired with Damian’s soft chiding voice, “Now then, Alfred, Titus, you know better than to bother our new friend-”

A horse’s neigh. A wolf’s howl. Young adults laughing and chatting, hands moving through fur and over scales. There’s something swimming in the lake and its heartbeat sounds _ massive.  _ Is that an elephant trumpeting?

Yes. Yes it is.

“Bruce,” Clark asks, because how can he  _ not _ , “what  _ happened  _ here?”

And Bruce laughs.

“Welcome to the Wayne Manor Zoo, Clark.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> ARE YOU EVER JUST REALLY FLIPPIN TIRED FOLK?


	24. i never had nobody and no road home (i wanna be somebody to someone)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/24/2020
> 
> (Getting close, guys!)
> 
> *Chapter Title From Banners, Someone To You*
> 
> PROMPT:  
> Damian has to babysit his baby sisters, Mar'i Grayson and Helena Wayne. (batmango)
> 
> Warnings: really super vague allusions to bad childhood, but it's not the focus by any means.

Damian surveys the scene, his eyes sharp and his mind running through scenarios. 

He’s got some advantages, here, and he can only hope that it will allow him the upper hand.

One, he’s older than his opponents, and therefore has more experience. 

Two, he’s been actively trained in hand to hand combat, while his opponents have yet to start… probably.

Three, Titus and Ace will probably take his side if it came down to the end of the line and something  _ really  _ awful was at stake. Probably.. 

And finally, number four, he’s got an entire think of Alfred’s cookies in his backpack, and he’s not afraid to use them.

He narrows his eyes. He’s prepared as he will ever be.

But his opponents… they’re not to be easily underestimated. Not after what happened to Jason.

One of them has super strength, after all, and a pretty proficient use of energy blasts. As well as the power of flight.

And the other one is just a downright menace, with a wicked intelligence to boot. 

Damian is going to need to keep all his wits about him, if he’s going to make it through this in one piece and mostly sane. He  _ cannot  _ let down his guard.

So he watches his opponents with an intense expression, tracking their every move.

Mar’i is bouncing up and down like a living breathing pogo stick, practically vibrating as she insists on one hug after another, planting sloppy kisses on Grayson’s cheek and then happily bounding back, only to come back in for another moments later. She’s practically  _ vibrating  _ with excitement, and perhaps nerves, and when Koriand’r leans in to pull her into her arms she goes willingly, snuggling into the embrace with an enthusiasm that spoke more of a bunny rabbit than an actual human being.

Dick laughs, plants a kiss on his daughter’s forehead, and then goes and pulls Damian into a hug, too. And because this is  _ Grayson,  _ and there are far worse things in the world than expressing a small show of physical affection, he leans into it, humming slightly at the warm press of his older brother’s broad chest.

He keeps his eyes on the targets, though. 

While Mar’i giggles and squirms in her mother’s arms, a much less energetic scene is happening a few feet away. Helena stands sharp with eyes focused and shoulders relaxed, nodding along as Bruce continues with his check list of reminders and cautions.

“Bedtime is at eight, and I expect you to help Damian with putting Mar’i down.

“Got it.”

“Make sure you brush your teeth.”

“Will do.”

“Stay away from the stove.”

“Yup.”

“And the knives.”

“But Mom’s already taught me how to use the kniv-

_ “Stay away from the knives.” _

Selina, standing behind the pair and watching in vague amusement, lets out a quiet laugh and winks sneakily at her daughter. 

Helena manages a far less stealthy wink back, looking rather like she suddenly had an utterly violent, silent sneeze but still managing to close one eye.

Bruce whirls around to look at his wife, who puts on an innocent  _ Who me?  _ Expression. Helena muffles her laughter behind the palms of her hands, and Bruce sighs, looking skyward.

Damian doesn’t even try to hide his smirk.

His father shoots him the stink eye. 

This is to be expected, and he smirks all the harder.

Another sigh, and suddenly everyone in the room is smirking at the old man kneeling on the floor, even though Mar’i doesn’t seem to quite understand why they’re all doing it.

Bruce points at Helena, and then at Mar’i.

“Behave yourself.”

“We will!”

“Alright, then. My job here is done. Selina?”

“Ready, Bruce. We’ve all just been waiting on you.”

“Oh. Okay.”

And finally the adults are out the door, Mar’i scrambling up for one last flying kiss that sends Dick stumbling backwards down the steps, only stopped from a nasty fall by Koriand’r and her expectant, steady hands.

(Flying superhuman tackle hugs are a norm around the Grayson household.)

Father ruffles Damian’s hair on the way out, smiles genuinely and soft, says in a quiet tone that marks all the secrets of the universe, “Have fun. Be safe. I love you all.”

Helena plants a kiss on their father’s cheek. Mar’i follows with a much sloppier sequel right over the man’s nostrils.

Then Dick’s voice is heard echoing, “Bruce! C’mon!”

And all the adults are officially gone.

Damian breathes deep, steadies himself, braces for the difficult task ahead of him.

Babysitting has begun.

“Right,” says Damian, trying to set the tone for the evening with a calm and steady voice, “I say we head straight to the kitchen and start making dinner-”

Helena’s piercing voice interrupts before he can even get rolling.

“But it’s only four o’clock! And Dad said not to go near the knives!”

Mar’i, floating up a good two feet before he snaps and arm out and snags her arm, pulling her back down, also pipes in.

“Yeah! Yeah! And I wanna  _ play!” _

Damian breathes.

“Fine. What would you like-”

Mar’i is no longer listening. Mar’i has swung Helena onto her back and has a death grip on his wrist, blasting through the parlour and down the hallway before he even has time to blink.

That’s the downside of having a three year old with superstrength: they have no impulse control, and unless you are similarly gifted, you have no way of stopping yourself from being dragged around like a rag doll.

Damian is not so similarly gifted.

… he gets dragged around his own house like a rag doll.

Helena is whooping from her perch, cackling like a mad man and having a grand old time. Damian is not the least bit resentful of his younger sister, not in any way, even when she laughs at him when he has to execute a particularly harrowing dodge around a corner and slips and stumbles.

Gritting his teeth, he sprints all the harder, and resigns himself to endurance training for however long his niece can keep up the pace.

_ This,  _ he thinks,  _ is going to be a very long night. _

One hour later, and the kids are set up watching  _ Atlantis,  _ mostly because Damian has a headache after an hour of Mari’s shrill shrieks of joy and Helena’s shark-like chortling, and this was the only movie they could all agree on that had no singing _.  _

They’re about halfway through, and Damian realizes that it’s nearing six, so he stoically asks what the girls want for dinner.

The older girl doesn’t bother to respond, too wrapped up in the movie. But the younger of the two turns her wide luminescent green eyes on him and declares, just as resolutely, “Chicken nuggets.”

Damian nods, because while not the healthiest food in the world, chicken nuggets would still be a good source of protein.

“And?” he prompts.

The small eyebrows on Mari’s forehead crinkle in confusion, and then resolutely in determination, then her whole face lights up and she leans in close, whispering excitedly, “ _ More chicken nuggets.” _

Helena whacks him on the shoulder. “Shhh,” she says, eyes intent on the screen, “I’m watching.”

Damian lowers his voice to something barely above a mumble, relying on the child’s superior hearing to make out his words.

“You can’t just have chicken nuggets. A well balanced meal is important for your physiology.”

Mar’i blinks at him. Damian blinks back.

Then slowly, carefully, she puts two small hands on his cheeks and says firmly,  _ “Chicken nuggets.” _

“But what about vegetables!”

“I don’t  _ want  _ vegetables! I want  _ chicken nuggets!” _

“Fiber is crucial for maintaining-”

“BE QUIET I’M WATCHING A MOVIE!”

Both of their mouths snap up with a sharp click, and niece and uncle share nervous looks before quieting down, letting the movie play on in peace.

Finally, right as Kida enters the glowing pool of her ancestors, Damian leaves to make their meal for the evening, making sure to grab a head of broccoli from the fridge and set a pot of water to boil, if only for the principle of the matter.

(He puts the trees on everyone's plates, and when Mar’i turns her nose up at them and munches stubbornly on her chicken nuggets with an atrocious amount of ketchup…)

(Damian breathes and lets it go. He’s learned to pick and choose his battles.)

Less than an hour left to go, and they’re building a train track, Jason having long since taught him his notorious skills.

Except, as he puts said skills to use, he finds concentrating to be incredibly difficult. Because he’ll start building one section and then - 

“Dami, Mar’i broke the track again!”

He sighs sharply through his nose.

“Then fix it, Helena.”

“But  _ you  _ fix it  _ better.” _

“But I’m busy building this part over here, see?”

“But you’ve gotta fix  _ this  _ section over  _ here. Damiiii~” _

Damian closes his eyes. Why does he have so many siblings?  _ Why? _

Mari, who is happily dragging her train along the wooden pathways, stumbles and knocks over a bridge that he had just fixed some moments before.

She freezes, turns to look Damian in the eye.

“Oops,” she says, and then she  _ giggles. _

Damian sighs, and leans over to fix it.

And finally, finally, bedtime. He slips Helena on his back, her sharp heels digging into his stomach while her hands cling a shade too tight around his neck. Mar’i he holds in the esteemed potato sack position, hanging limply in his one-armed grip, swaying and laughing all the while.

When she laughs, she sounds like Grayson.

Damian swings her too and fro, too and fro, and smiles softly when it makes her laugh all the harder.

They make a pit stop at the bathroom, brushing teeth and changing into PJ’s. They both insist he sings the toothbrushing song, which he refuses to do, but he does recite it in a monotone voice that has both of them laughing.

Helena is humming a song he doesn’t recognize, jostling him with her knees. When he overturns her onto her bed she goes with a little  _ oomph,  _ looks up at him with amused eyes that challenge the sacrality of bedtime. 

She’s got Bruce’s eyes, and sometimes, sometimes- when Damian is feeling particularly bitter towards a childhood he never got to have, filled with soft rumbling concerns and nights of movies and family dinners, filled with  _ family- _ he wishes he had eyes to match.

He doesn't, he  _ doesn’t _ . His eyes are green, and sometimes that aches deeper than it should, even after all these years.

But that is not what makes a family. 

Family is this, just this, Damian reaching out and grabbing a storybook to read without prompting, mouth pouring over a familiar tune that reverberates in his chest, filing through the girls’ questions and redirecting their attention to the ongoing plot with a sort of patience his younger self would not possess.

_ This  _ is family, this growth, this natural balance between comfort and chaos. The way he complains and sighs and rolls his eyes and complies, complies, complies, finding tiny new ways to make the people he loves smile, finding his own new ways of smiling with every passing day.

Family is this, just this, soft touches and gentle warmth, fierce and terrible and vibrant  _ love.  _ Family is the people he defines himself with, the ones he holds close and protective to his chest with hands that were trained to only ever be hardened. 

Half an hour later, both of the girls are down for the count, and Damian smiles to himself and keeps the door open behind him, leaving them to rest. 

They will never know the locked doors of his childhood. Will never have the same calluses on their tiny fingers, the same blisters on their tiny toes. They will grow, and it will never be a hardship.

And if it ever is, they will always have people there supporting them through it. They will not have to walk alone.

Damian finishes up a book report for a class and sketches idle little things in his artbook, the peculiar unnatural glint that shines in his niece’s eyes when she’s excited. Helena, mouth full of broccoli and pulling faces. 

Idle little things that mean nothing. Idle little things that mean the world.

And eventually, eventually, the parents get home for the night. 

Dick finds him on the couch, laughs at his rumpled appearance and pulls him into a hug to soften the blow. Bruce smiles and silently ruffles both of their heads as he passes, making Dick squawk indignantly and Kori laugh brightly somewhere behind them.

“Thanks for doing this, Dami. We really appreciate it. Did everything go okay?”

And he nods, settles a little more soundly into the hug, and relaxes inch by inch by inch.

Family is so much more than the blood running through his veins.

He closes his eyes and breathes it all in, Dick humming softly above his head.

And as far as Damian’s concerned, it’s the best sound in the entire world.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys I have spent more time on the Batman Wikki this month than most people will spend on there their entire lives. :0
> 
> We're getting close to the end!


	25. put a gun against his head (pulled my trigger, now he's dead)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/25/2020
> 
> Chapter Title From Queen, Bohemian Rhapsody
> 
> PROMPT: a villain au? (Applesandbananas)
> 
> *WARNINGS* Mentions of murder and death and good people doing bad things.

_ Tell me this: what defines a hero? _

Is it their valour? Their strength? The certainty of their morals? The fact that they do good in this world so full of corrupt and broken things?

_ What? _

It is not a question easily answered.

In one universe, Bruce Wayne crumples besides his lifeless parents and vows  _ Never again, _ and it becomes the mantra of his entire soul.

In this universe, the little boy vows much the same, and chases down the criminal right then and there.

There’s a gunshot, and you can guess who’s still left standing.

_ Love is the most dangerous weapon of all. Never forget. _

_ Love is a double edged sword and it strikes swift and terrible. People are known to do impossible things for love. They have lifted cars over their heads for it, lied for it, gone so deep underground the sun is meer myth. _

_ People have killed for love. _

_ And grief is but love in another form. _

Thieves and greedy politicians, murderers and rapists and monsters that prowl under the guise of human skins.

The Batman is a myth. A legend, old lore from an old city with an old heart.

And yet-

There are whispers on the streets and scandals among seedy billionaires who become millionaires in a single night, and then nothing at all. The shadows seem to move when you’re not watching too closely, and villains and thugs alike are running scared.

People are going missing. They’re not coming back alive.

The ordinary civilians say nothing. What is there to say? When bad men get what’s coming for them, Gothamites avert their eyes and continue about their lives, one worry lighter.

The line between between good and evil is simply that, a line. It is all too easy to step over, to toe it’s thin edges and stumble too far. 

Everyone is composed of the lines in the sand that they make for themselves. They drag their truths in wet dirt and call it the edges of humanity, unknowing and uncaring that reality has waves to sweep their creations away.

It is not so hard to convince children with trauma in their bones and anger in their hearts that there are monsters in this world better eradicated. The kids happen on accident, finding him in the dark where the shadows are deepest. Some of them have been killing all their lives, some of them are just terrified and alone. Some are just wielding life’s no powerful weapon, a double edged sword of love and grief.

In this universe, Tony Zucco never makes it off the rooftop. Joker dies in mere days after his first big reveal. Fighting will always be easier than making a conscious effort to hold back.

In this universe, things are simpler, because problems who are people can vanish with a well aimed bullet.

In this universe, the Justice League forms slower. There is no grand watchtower orbiting the earth. Less planning, less funding, less organization. The come together because they are a group of most extraordinary abilities and they want to do good, and people who want the same things so often find each other.

They have less back up plans. Less fail safes. More optimism, yes, but less realism and more hard failures. They strive, they fall, they get through things with sheer power and determination. 

And all along, all along, the Batman plays at the edges of their consciousness, walking the shadows hidden in the back of their minds. 

So what is the difference between evil and good and light and dark?

Is there such a thing?

Murder is evil, isn’t it? Ending another human being of their very existence, cutting them low and then down into nothing at all. It is an absence at the center of everything. It is loss.

It is e v i l .

And yet-

Soldiers are not persecuted for ending another’s life. They are rallied as heroes, not murderers. 

_ What is the difference? _

(We are the lines in the sand we created for ourselves.)

“Don’t do this,” Superman says, voice like iron, like stone, “You don’t want to do this.”

It can be hard to fight supervillains.

Because they can be better equipped than you, when it comes down to it. Superheroes don’t have some great communal bank account to support their needs, to repair their suits and create gadgets. They’re ordinary people with ordinary salaries, simply trying to do the right thing.

Because they can be smarter than you. Wicked smart, and they wield their silver tongues and talented fingers without regret. 

Because they know your weaknesses, when they twist your words and your morals and your heart.

It can be hard to fight supervillains. Even when they’re not super in anyway.

The Batman is looking at him through blank white eyes. In the shadows are his gathered brood. In one fist he contains a sharp shard of kryptonite. In his other fist is a man beaten and bloodied and hardly breathing.

The villain tilts his head, considering the living god before him.

And then-

“Money launderer, rapist, trafficker- this man offers nothing for society. He is not good. He is not kind. He should not be saved.”

A grimace that could have passed for a smile, in another life.

“Who are you to tell me he is?”

And then Batman lets go.

Superman dives for the falling criminal, something like doubt in his chest. 

(It can be hard to fight supervillains, because sometimes, sometimes, they just might be right.)

By the time he gets back to the ledge, the shrouded figures have vanished back into the dark.

He goes looking.

But the Batman is a ghost in the wind, and no one’s snitching on one of their own.

_ Tell me this, tell me this: what defines a villain? _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Guys this chapter was fighting me every step and the end result is a mess and I'm sorry to be gifting you such poor work. Will DEFINITELY be revamping this chapter, and possibly replacing it entirely just because I dislike it so much.
> 
> :/


	26. i'm reaching out to touch your voice (but baby i'm clutching at straws)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/26/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Agape, Bear's Den*
> 
> PROMPT: in your previous fic March Madness you have a chapter where the bat family got affected by magic and had different powers because of that (Tim mind reading, Damian empath, etc) could you do a continuation where there are lingering affects (especially one with Tim and Damian lol they are my favs of you haven’t guessed) (MayZar)
> 
> WARNINGS: None
> 
> THIS IS A CONTINUATION OF A PREVIOUS FIC: MARCH MADNESS CHAPTER 16  
> Do you need to read that chapter to get this chapter? Not necessarily. Here's what you have to know: Tim and a few others of the Batfam were cursed with magic. Tim got telepathic abilities and he... wasn't having a good time with half of Gotham screaming in his head, to say the least.

Magic sucks.

Magic  _ sucks. _

Tim breathes through his nose, rubbing at his aching head. It’s better than it was before, when the thoughts of thousands seemed to be clawing at the very foundations of his mind, jumbled words and ideas and compulsions warring with each other, a thousand perspectives crammed into one being too small to take the load.

It’s better, because Tim is no longer curled up on the ground, can leave the underground bunker without much hassle. Because he can  _ think,  _ because he can do more than just try and keep his insanity intact.Because his head is no longer splitting in two.

But it was  _ supposed  _ to be gone all together- Zatanna had come and fixed it, she had said  _ she had fixed it. _

And yet-

And yet here he is, swallowing tylenol, laying down in his dark room and breathing even because sometimes that’s just what you had to do. 

It’s probably just a migraine. It’s probably nothing at all.

_ Breathe. _

He’s beginning to notice things, during patrol. Nothing obvious, nothing clear- just sometimes he’ll be swinging along and a sudden  _ something  _ overcomes him, and he finds himself drawn inexplicably to some alleyway or another, as if called by a silent cry for help. And every time,  _ every time,  _ someone is there, desperate and afraid.

It’s disconcerting.

But that’s only the start of it. Because Tim is realizing, too, that there’s a sort of innate knowledge growing in his chest for when someone lies. Like a voice, whispering in the back of his mind. Quiet but  _ there. _

And other things, other things- he finds himself grabbing a cup of orange juice for Duke even though the boy never explicitly asked for it. He’s at the store with Stephanie and the perfect gift for her upcoming birthday pops into the forefront of his thoughts, when present giving is usually one of his greatest struggles. Halfway through an interrogation, and a hunch will hit him straight in the face so clearly it almost aches. 

And it’s all coincidence, obviously. His mind jumping to conclusions, making connection with the subconscious external stimuli already there. How could it  _ not  _ be? Tim, for all his skills and strengths, has always been pure blooded human.

And yet-

The human brain is capable of incredible things, adapting in the face of certain doom just because it is so hell bent on survival. You can remove half of it entirely and still be walking and functioning, given the right conditions. 

And even now, there is still so much to learn.

Tim curls his fingers, looks at his hands. He hardly remembers those first twenty four hours after the magic blast, the way the physical world slipped farther and farther from his reach as spiraled down the rabbit hole of other people’s thoughts screaming in his head.

There is a Greek Myth about Athena, detailing how she had burst forth from her Zeus’ forehead after he had swallowed her mother whole. About how the pain had been so great, this newly made goddess rampaging inside his mind, Zeus had tried to break his own head open to relieve it, allowing her to escape.

Tim remembers thinking about that myth, vaguely and far away, deep underground and as far as society as he could manage. He remembers thinking that he, too, would carve his own mind a part if it would just make the voices  _ stop. _

He remembers.

Clearly,  _ obviously _ , this whole thing is just a coincidence. And yet-

And yet Martian Manhunter had been in his  _ brain,  _ tweaking his barriers until the deafening screams of thousands quietened down to a dull roar. And yet Tim had  _ lived,  _ lived for a week with these voices in his minds, survived for a whole three days even when their had been nothing at all to soften the blow.

And the human brain is capable of incredible things,  _ impossible  _ things. It adapts, it adapts because it wants to survive, and, well- stranger things have happened than a telepathic echo.

So maybe it’s not just coincidence after all.

Maybe.

The question is, then, is if he’s the only one. He keeps his eye out for signs in the others, to see of Cass ever walks a bit stiffer, or walks away unscathed from a swipe of a knife meant to make her bleed. If Damian seems more vulnerable, more volatile, more responsive to high tensions in a room. If Dick sometimes lands a little too fast to be completely normal-

He looks. He waits. He wonders.

And inside his mind, there’s a voice, and it’s telling him he already knows.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's exam time, my bois, and i'm struggling. Sorry this is so short (it's just crazy busy and stressy around here)- but I persevere for the cause!
> 
> If you too are suffering from examinations, be STRONG!! YOU GOT THIS!


	27. i'll be no outlaw, no renegade (just your faithful god of loss)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/27/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Darlingside, The God of Loss*
> 
> PROMPT:Not to imply that how Talia was portrayed in this chapter is bad but I am sure you could great with a GoodMom!Talia story too. Damian and Jason are pretty common in those kinds of fics so you could mix it up by Talia being close with Dick, Tim, Cass or Duke. (batmango)
> 
> EXCEPT I FAILED THE PROMPT AND SO NOW YOU JUST HAVE A TALIA CENTERED FIC ABOUT MORALITY AND CHANGE AND I??? HONESTLY HAVE NO CLUE WHAT'S GOING ON??
> 
> *WARNINGS* There are mentions of child abuse and rape- specifically focused around Damian's conception. Also, murder.

Talia is not a good woman.

There is blood on her hands and scars in her heart. This is a woman who has killed, who has taken fragile grasping tendrils of life and crushed them into nothing. She has lied, manipulated, stolen and shattered the wills of men old and grown, and she will do so again if it came down to it.

She doesn’t keep track of names. She does not regret. People are the choices they make for themselves and she made hers a long time ago.

 _You are rock and bone,_ her father told her, the demon’s head, a man who could not die, _and the mere mortal world cannot touch you._

But that’s the thing, isn’t it? To exist is to be changed, to be transformed by life’s touch, one that will not always been gentle, one that will not always be kind.

She has died, this woman, has bled and ached and broke and come back to life again. She is not young. She is not _good-_

And yet-

Here she is.

There is a child on her hands and something not quite stone in her chest. 

There is a _choice._

And for one of the first times in her long, long life Talia is uncertain.

Because here is the truth: she was young, once. 

She knows this place, the way it gathers under your skin. The way it eats away at you until you become rock and bone inside, because anything else means to break and fall apart completely. She has stood on hot coals and been burned for her efforts. She has wasted valuable water with her tears while stranded in the desert for the sake of a training exercise. She has had small hands and small feet splattered with blood.

She _knows._

And there is a baby in her arms and he is her own. He is so _tiny,_ here, cradled against her chest. He mews and he weeps and he is helpless.

Talia looks at him and there is something some might call mercy in her chest, carving itself into stone, something some might even call love.

And of course the little boy grows, like all little boys tend to do. He crawls and then he waddles and then he runs, and then-

And then it is time for his training to begin. Two years old, of course, is the perfect time to teach a child that they are a weapon to be controlled and wielded. They are easy to mould, then. Easy to break.

Talia is a weapon of her father’s making, and she knows, she knows, she _knows-_

But one thing about abuse is that it never ends. One thing about parents is that it is so easy to love them, even when you shouldn’t, because they are all you have ever known. One thing about life is that sometimes we blind ourselves to our own opportunities because we are fearful, because we are afraid.

This is not an excuse. There is no excuse of willfully keeping a child in an abusive situation. There is a choice, always a choice, and to choose _that-_

Damian has her eyes, his father’s sharp nose, and his grandfather’s high brow. He is three years old and learning fast. He is three years old and already he knows to hide tears because they will only get you beaten, because they are a waste of water when you are in a dessert you can’t escape, because weapons are not allowed to cry.

He is three years old. He is so very small.

And her stone chest _aches._

Talia is not a good woman. She has killed and maimed and she does not repent.

But there is a choice, and Talia looks at a boy with a chest made of something more than bone and decides that this place will never eat away at him like it did her.

To exist is to be changed, to be transformed by life’s touch, one that will not always been gentle, one that will not always be kind. 

To exist is to love.

They travel, for a while, long days and longer nights. Her father has had many mercenaries trained over the years, but she has always been the best.

She puts those skills to use.

She takes odd jobs and a collection of identities, camps out away from society, trains her child to hunt, to kill, to survive. She is brisk and no nonsense, but her hands are gentle: _this is a pressure point and if you strike hard enough, you can rupture a spleen. This is a knife and it is a weapon. Use it so you may survive, because the world is not kind and it does not care that you are young: it will try to kill you anyways._

Damian will still grow up with blood on his hands. The difference is that it will very rarely ever be his own. The difference is that he will never be told to strike first.

It is not much. But Talia is not a good woman. She is a mother with porous stone in her chest instead of a heart, and they are both trying to survive a man who does not die, one who will be hunting them forever.

Eventually, they find themselves in Gotham, at Wayne Manor’s door.

Damian is six. He is still so small.

Bruce looks at him, standing besides her straight backed and sharp-eyed. Sees the colour in those orbs, the way they match hers. Sees that high brow and the way it resonates with Ra A’Ghul. 

Sees his own rigid nose.

There is anger in this man’s chest and something like grief, something like a cataclysm of broken shards pouring into his lungs.

(He was drugged. He had no say. He didn’t _know,_ didn’t remember, couldn’t remember, _he was drugged-)_

(The world is not kind and it does not care if you are strong and male: it can still touch you in the worst of ways and leave you no say in it at all, no matter how it shatters your foundations of stone and bone.)

Talia stands on the edge of the doorstep. She does not regret, cannot regret. 

Weapons are not allowed to cry.

It is not an excuse. There is never an excuse for rape. There is a choice, there is _always a choice,_ and to choose _that-_

Talia is not a good woman. She is a mother, trying to do the best by her son. 

Damian gets taken into the manor, guided by Dick’s gentle hand and Alfred’s warm presence while Bruce wrestles with his own sense of violation every time he gets a glimpse of those green eyes.

Damian gets taken in. He grows up surrounded by love. By kindness. By a kind of training that does not hurt nor ache nor leave you covered in blood not your own. 

Damian gets taken in. Talia does not.

_[Later, later, Damian will be older and wiser and they will be at one of their few alloted meetups, and her son will be ten years old and still so small._

_“Do you ever… regret?” he’ll ask her, staring at his hands that have not been splattered with blood in a long, long time. That will always carry the stains from when they were._

_Talia will respond, “I will never regret saving you.”]_

She escapes into the wider world, travels and fights and lives. She finds herself in the crevices of her own existence, one that is mortal and fragile and touched in a thousand ways by life’s tendrils. 

She does not regret. Cannot regret.

Damian is alive. He will not be hollowed out and filled with stone.

She made her choices, and she will live with them.

This is not an excuse. It is just what it is. 

Talia is not a good woman, but she is here. 

She gathers money as a mercenary, and when that becomes too attention grabbing she creates a false identity and settles down in the Narrows of Gotham City. And then, because the fight is in her blood, she starts up a free dojo club for youth to learn self defense.

Young fierce girls and brash boys enter her small studio, and she runs through different martial arts and pressure points and battle techniques. She does not soften her voice, but her hands are gentle, and her students learn fast under her steady gaze that is ages too deep.

It is supposed to be temporary, an identity built for laying low until it was safe to creep back out into the wider world.

But Talia guides small hands and small feet not yet grown into proper form and listens to the teenagers laugh and spar and fill themselves up with the way they can become _electricity_ when the adrenaline runs high enough. There are crevices in the scars in the scars on her chest and she enjoys feeling the ache, because it means she is alive.

We are the choices we make for ourselves. And for the first time in possibly all her life, Talia made a choice entirely for herself and no one else, and she stays.

She stays, and she teaches, and she lives. Talia is not a good woman: she has killed and maimed and manipulated, drugged a man not willing and took him to bed. She stole her son away in the dead of night and still taught him how to hold a blade. She stole herself away in the dead of the night and still committed to making grasping tendrils of existence nothing at all for something so menial as money.

Talia is not a good woman, but ask anyone who walked into her studio if she was loved and they would all say yes.

Funny, how our perceptions and our attachments make us do the craziest things. How it swipes the slate clean.

Talia lives. Her days pass. Children enter her dojo and leave it, find themselves on padded mats and under her steady gaze. She listens to them rage, listens to them work out their frustrations and joys. She listens.

Love is the most powerful thing in the world, and yet all the love in the world cannot save you from yourself. Only you can.

Talia lives, and she coughs up her stone chest in intervals of heaving gravel and grime. She weeps away the grime coating her soul with something that feels like repent, like a vow, like a _promise._ She breathes in the ache, and feels alive. 

She is not a weapon: she has tears to spare.

There is a choice. _There is always, always a choice._ It is never too late to make a new one.

She wakes up one day and looks in the mirror, realizes that there are strands of grey in her hair, wrinkles curling around her bright green orbs. Realizes that she is growing old, growing up, that the mortal life has grasped her tight and has no intention of letting her go.

She finds she doesn't mind it.

Funny, how existence changes us. How we are born to be changed.

Born to love.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hi if you're tired and present please raise your hand
> 
> *raises both hands so high I'm flung into outerspace*


	28. old enough to run (old enough to fire a gun)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/28/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Everything Everything, No Reptiles.*
> 
> PROMPT: Do you think you could make a reverse batfam chapter from Damian's POV? 
> 
> Warnings: Mentions of temporary character death

Damian is not the first, but he is the oldest.

Harper is made of sharp edges and high spirits. When he first shows up at the door, a bag full of possessions to his name and a chip on his shoulder, she scrutinizes him up and down, groans, and calls out to Alfred, “There’s another one!”

He doesn’t respond to this outside of pursed lips. He is twelve years old and there’s a chip on his shoulder and something aching in his chest, and he is angry and violent and desperate for somewhere to turn.

Harper welcomes him as if it was the principle of the matter, ten years old and young and small and  _ determined. _

She was the first. Bluebird: partner of Batman of three years. Snarky and determined, flinging herself into fight after fight like she needed it to breathe. She fights dirty and rough and  _ fast,  _ a firework of movement in comparison to his father’s clinical detachment and rough hand. She is not the light to his dark but she was present and steady, she carried the weight, and that is more than Damian could say.

And sometimes, even now, Damian  _ seethes  _ because she got to be by his father’s side while he himself was lost and cornered and lonesome.

Sometimes.

But mostly, he just lives.

But perhaps living in and of itself is a vengeful act. His grandfather had planned to sacrifice him, to take over his mortal form. His grandfather had wanted to  _ kill  _ him and his mother had not tried to stop him, and so he left for the only other place he knew to be safe, the only other place that could possibly be home.

But Wayne Manor isn’t home. Not for a long, long time. It’s a place to live set apart from assassins, a place of rules he does not understand, a place full of people he can not connect to.

Where there is Harper there is also Cullen. Eight years old and smoother around the edges, having already spent three years somewhere safe and kind. You are more flexible, when you are young. So much harder to break when your future stretches on forever in front of you, when your little bones are made to mend. It does not take so long to feel loved and protected, not when you are five years old, not when you are still picking apart the universe and trying to see how everything fits.

Cullen still looks at him with weary eyes and sharp fingers. And Damian averts his gaze tries to shake off the feeling that the little boy can see all his aching parts.

He does not succeed.

And then there’s Duke, second partner to Batman, who matches Harper in age if not in stature. (He’s small for his years, built compact and wiry and bright, catching up on his weight after a year on the streets.) The boy keeps trying to be friends, and Damian doesn’t know how to tell him that there is no room for friendship in his stone chest. That there is no room for anyone at all.

Caring is a weakness. It is always, always a weakness. And Damian needed an escape route, not a home.

And then... there’s Bruce.

Bruce, who forbids killing and guns and his katanas. Bruce, who isn’t old and mellowed but young and passionate and bright, hardly thirty two and trying to do his best with a household of kids that are a patchwork of issues and traumas and built up strengths made for survival. 

There is no easing into parenting for this man. No happy sunshine child content with a hug and a grunt of affirmation. Harper has been calling him on his bullshit from day one, standing up angrily and defiant for every little thing because that is how she sees good things: something you must fight for every day of your life. Duke is too brash and too confident and so incredibly sad. His parents were _good_ but are now also gone in a way beyond just death- a form of mourning is different and just as terrible. And Cullen spent his first year shaking, jumping at the smallest of sounds, mute and terrified of his own skin.

And now there’s Damian who is betrayed and prickly and so very angry, and Bruce is put together until he’s not, with so many kids under his wings and not enough tact or emotional intelligence to deal with them and all their problems.

He  _ tries,  _ but he and Damian are too much alike where it and still too different in all the places that matter, and the arguments rage up and down the house. 

(And there is no sunshine man to guide them.)

But still, still, Damian lives. And he learns. And he grows. 

He joins the crusade with his father, putting up a mask and slinking into the night. He’s good at what he does, efficient and still burning, and he lashes out against the constraints built around the patrol.

_ “I can handle myself,”  _ he hisses into Bruce’s face, and the man hisses back just as fierce,  _ “But they can’t- _ ”

And what a thought. What a thought, that you could still be young and untrained. That you could be loved and not have trained all of your life for it.

What a thought. 

So Damian keeps quiet and isolates himself. Stays curled up in his room and tries to control the fire thrumming in his veins because it is burning him alive. 

Because caring is not an advantage. Because he has been betrayed by the ones who were supposed to matter most.

But it’s hard, even in a house as large as the manor, to avoid contact entirely.

It’s hard, even as a child who was told they were a weapon, to avoid connections when offered.

Human beings are born to love. Never forget. We are born crying for help, for a hand to hold.

He finds himself going on long walks out in the forest with Duke. He spars with Harper, checks her homework when the adults are too busy to be of service. He and Cullen find an abandoned puppy in the rain and bring him in, taking care of the little creature until it’s healthy once more.

They keep it. They call it Ace.

It’s a process. Eventually, he and Bruce stop fighting so much. Eventually, he finds himself offering small smiles in return to his siblings beaming grins. Eventually, the manor becomes a home.

And then, two years after he showed up on the doorstep, Cass arrives.

Cass who is silent and deadly and hardly eleven years old. Cass, who is always looking over her shoulder, always reading the room. Cass, who is young and angry and and still learning to wipe away the blood on her hands.

She’s small,  _ tiny,  _ and her eyes are haunted. 

She’s… she’s too much like him. 

She looks at him with eyes full of understanding, and it is terrifying.

Damian has never been good at being afraid.

And he never has a chance to deal with it properly either, because he dies.

Sort of.

He’s brought back. It takes a year, and in that year he comes back with scars running too deep under his skin. He comes back and his family is older and more haunted and everything _ aches- _

And he is replaced. 

Tim is young, twelve years old in comparison to Damian’s scant fifteen, and he’s stolen Damian’s name and he’s stolen Damian’s costume and these were both things that he built up from the ground in his own image, both things that were  _ his,  _ only his, and they meant acceptance into something more than just a house.

And he is angry and aching and betrayed. And he’s falling apart in a thousand different ways. And he’s  _ trying- _

But Tim is whole in all the places Damian never could be. He’s smart and he’s brilliant and works so  _ well  _ with Bruce, and Damian hates it, he  _ hates it. _

But there’s very little he can do. Damian made a vow to wash his hands clean of red stains. He will not turn his back on this. He will not betray his honour.

So he and Tim fight. A lot. 

_ A lot. _

But when Tim’s home life is revealed, when Stephanie Brown enters the playing field in all her brash and brilliant eggplant glory, when Tim is resigned from his heroing duties and then comes back into it once more, parentless and broken and fractured in his chest-

Damian pats him roughly on the shoulder and offers him a chance to spar. And it’s something. It’s  _ something. _

Humans are born to love. Never forget.

Jason tries to steal the tires of the batmobile. He has no family. He has no home.

Bruce, predictably, takes him in.

Jason is ten. He’s missing his two front teeth and he swears so much Alfred has taken to swear jars being strategically placed all around the house. He reads like he needs it to live. He  _ loves  _ being a hero, in a sense that Damian perhaps has never gotten, never in all the long years of his life.

Damian offers Jason his well-used copy of  _ War and Peace.  _ Jason reads it in three days and hunts him down to debate literary motifs and themes, his words a garbled mix of street slang and not quite poetry.

Jason gets accepted into the fold, and all too soon he is killed.

None of them were fast enough.

Batman gets more violent. They all get more violent. There is a grief that cannot be explained,and  _ this  _ is why caring is not an advantage. It hurts too much. 

Damian wonders if this is how his family felt. If this is what it was like.

He hopes not. For their sake, he hopes not.

And then, years later, the boy is back.

He’s insane, eyes shining with pit madness and red staining his hands red. But he’s also fifteen and young and lost in a world he was no longer supposed to be apart of. 

He’s also not alone. Because Damian remembers. He remembers the ache.

They get their brother back. Sort of, if you can call this angry hollow shell of a human being that brilliant snarky child they all once knew. 

The violence does not stop.

Bruce doesn’t even consider taking in a kid for a long, long time.

And Damian is older now, wiser. He’s twenty two and working his way through college, taking classes in classical art and business. He still goes out at night and fights, but he knows that his insides are not stone. He knows more than how to break and obey.

And then there’s a circus.

And then there’s  _ Dick. _

Dick, who is eight years old and brilliant. Dick, who is sunshine in all the ways so many of them could never be. Who shines so brightly and  _ grieves. _ Who is rash and fierce when he needs to be but is so often content with a simple hug, a small smile of approval, a tiny sign of affection. 

And with the Wayne Manor full of people, he rarely has to go looking for it.

The boy finds him one day, curled up with his sketchbook in a patch of rare Gotham sunshine. He crawls into his lap without a word, humming curiously over his art, reaching out absentmindedly to pet Alfred the Cat.

“I like your picture,” Dick says. 

Damian nods, shades another small section.

“Can you teach me?”

And Damian, who is older and wiser and softer still, reaches out with hands meant to hold, and shows him.


	29. it was a fusion of confusion (with a few confounding things)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/29/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title from Barenaked Ladies, One Little Slip*
> 
> PROMPT: So you know Matches Malone, Batman's undercover identity. What if the whole batfam goes out as the Malone family to have a night on the town without having to deal with reporters? Maybe even to a "Rogues' bar". 'Lil Matches is Damian's undercover person for example.
> 
> Hope you enjoy!

This is where the problem starts:

Bruce needs to go undercover.  _ Deep  _ undercover. Matches has a deal going down with some of the most auspicious drug dealers in Gotham- and Batman has a date with some criminals to set up. A relationship has to be established, trust has to be built. He’s going to be watched all odd hours of the day by people he has to pretend not to see. 

He needs a week, at the very least. Possibly a little more.

And normally, this wouldn’t be any trouble. Dick could spend the time at the manor, catching up on sleep and schoolwork, hanging out with Alfred-

Except Alfred is on a well deserved break overseas, and sending Dick over there just wouldn’t be fair.

It really, really doesn’t help that his kid is a tiny little  _ shit _ hell bent on sticking his nose in  _ all  _ of Bruce’s business, and figures out that Matches has a lead and the deal is going down.

Dick, who is twelve years and grinning far too innocently, hanging upside down from the t-rex and swinging idly back and forth.

Because of course he is. Of  _ course  _ he is.

“Bruce! Seriously! Just take me with you. I’ll be good- I  _ promise.” _

Batman grunts.

“You  _ always  _ say that.”

“Are you saying I’m not a man of my word? Foreshame, B,  _ foreshame.” _

“...you’re terrible.”

“Yeah, probably, but that’s why you _ looove _ me~”

Bruce doesn’t say anything, fights to keep the smile off his face, and grunts again.

Dick beams all the wider, leaping  _ off  _ the dinosaur, free falling for a split second and then executing a perfect little tuck and roll landing.

On solid concrete.

_ Jesus. This kid is going to give him grey hairs- _

Bruce’s laments are cut off when his ward’s weight is suddenly slumped onto his back, curious eyes peeping at the classified documents in his hands. With an annoyed twitch of his shoulder, he hides them from view, making Dick sigh exasperatedly and push himself up, leaning up and over the older man’s head so they can make eye contact.

“C’mon, B, think about it! We catch the bad guys, I get some training for going undercover, we get some bonding time- what’s not to like!?”

_ The part where it puts you needlessly in danger,  _ he thinks, but doesn’t say out loud.

“Robin, no.”

“Please?”

_ “No.” _

Two weeks later, Dick is (secretly) grinning victoriously in the middle of a mob. His hair is slicked back and dyed brown, there are shades hiding his coloured contacts (brown eyes instead of blue), and a pair of platform shoes to make him look taller, a touch of makeup to make him look older.

The various thugs- sans the leader- seem pretty happy to babysit. Which is good, because Bruce has been asking for a sitter all week and everyone’s turned him down.

Their still scared because of that whole incident with Hal. Which is unfair: it’s not  _ Dick’s  _ fault that the lantern is a dumbass and so easily trolled.

But yes. No one volunteered to take care of his kid, and now said kid is halfway through explaining a particularly challenging version of hopscotch.

Because that’s Bruce’s life, apparently. 

And afterwards, when another tentative deal had been made with much glaring and curses and subtle power plays- interrupted by peals of laughter from Dick and Co.- one of the thugs comes up and offers Matches a grin.

“Good kid you’ve got there,” says the man, balding and skinny, “Should bring ol’ Robbie around again some time.”

Matches Malone glares the man into suspicion. Robbie Malone, from where he’s casually showing off his knives, hides his smile.

It only escalates from there.

Jason never has a run, when he’s Robin, but somewhere in between pit madness and reconciliation, Matches Malone is in a lone warehouse- trying to strike a deal and waiting for a third party- when a young man walks in.

A young man who, despite his disguise, is rather clearly Jason Todd.

A young man who spots Bruce and freezes for half a moment, eyebrows raising.

The woman who Matches had been arguing with catches on all too quick, looks back and forth between them.

“Something the matter? You know this guy, Sharps?”

Bruce, who has put too much into this operation to lose it, says, “Course he does, he’s my cousin.”

And Jason, because he’s well trained and quick on his feet, slides into his role as easy as pie.

“ _ Eh- _ ” he says, smirk crawling up his features, “Matches. How ya doin?”

Matches shrugs. The woman eyes them.

“You vouch for him?”

Sharps slides into his seat, kicks his feet back.

“Ye, he’s family. Can’t go turnin’ your back on family.”

The woman nods. The negotiations continue.

Bruce Wayne, somewhere tucked deep under his cover, feels something warm.

Tim finds him, plops down an inch thick manilla folder in front of his face, and then leaves just as quickly.

Bruce blinks.

Tim doesn’t look back.

Inside the folder is a neatly organized identity for Colton “Cracker” Malone, nephew of Matches Malone and somehow, succinctly, always a part of the mob and Matches general existence. 

Because this, apparently, is how his life works.

Somewhere around when Stephanie and Cass enter the undercover game, and old attendee at the local bar leans over to his partner and whispers, “Eh, Malone sure brought company, eh?”

His partner glances around the room, at the six Malone’s scattered throughout, all their eyes shaded and postures deceptively casual.

“Eh,” he says, “it’s the mob: What can you do?”

It’s this mentality that probably saves face for Matches Malone as yet another kid joins the fold. And then another. And then  _ another,  _ until it gets to the point that if Matches doesn’t walk into the room with a small army of Malone’s behind him, he gets questioned over it.

Duke finds the whole thing hilarious, and takes to dramatically upping his role as Harper’s love sick boyfriend every time he comes into his character. Harper, who is of a similar brand of humour, retaliates just as besottedly.

They both always cackle the whole way home.

Damian, who has been banned from speaking whenever in his disguise, has been nicknamed Lil’ Matches by the staff of the rogue bars they frequent, and the servers have started making him free snacks.

And it’s ridiculous. The whole thing is ridiculous, and yet here they are. Matches Malone has somehow adopted Bruce’s family and Batman’s family alike, the people he cares most about slotting into place around him one by one by one. 

_ Bonding time _ , Dick had called it, so many years ago, and Matches looks around at his mixing bowl of children, disguised under layers of makeup and clothing and prosthetics, all spending time together in a shabby rogue’s bar, playing up parts and making little hidden challenges and dares that pass and forth amongst their group almost too fast for the eye to see-

Matches looks at it.  _ Bruce  _ looks at it, and he thinks that his eldest just might be right.

Bonding time as a mob family.

Well, weirder things have happened.


	30. and i had a feeling that i belonged (i had a feeling i could be someone)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/30/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From: Fast Car, Tracy Chapman*
> 
> Alfred is a god and I haven't paid enough attention to him! :)

Alfred Pennyworth wakes up, blindfolded, tied to a chair.

Internally, he sighs.

There are the distant sounds of gruff men chatting with each other in a strange mix of slang and code, rough words tumbling from slurred drunken tongues.

It is a distinct lack of professionalism, really. At least the last kidnappers had the tact to be classy about the whole hostage situation, with a proper underground lair and well furnished furniture. 

This time, unless he’s distinctly mistaken- and he very rarely is- it appears he’s been trussed up to  _ a cheap fold-up chair. _

The  _ audacity. _

Alfred Pennyworth is a man who knows his worth. And he is worth so much more than this plastic monstrosity..

Besides, if he remembers correctly past the haze of drugs in his system, he had been in the middle of a  _ grocery run.  _ What civilized person deigns to kidnap a man when he is shopping? Has the world fallen so far that a butler can’t gather his comestibles in peace?

Apparently so.

And he had had frozens, too. Probably all sodden by now. Absolutely worthless.

Stew was on the menu for tonight, Master Duke’s favourite. They’ll have to have it tomorrow, then, because everyone knows a good stew takes hours to simmer, and by the time he’s out of this mess it’ll probably be too late. 

_ Bullocks. _

An armed thug enters his room, smelling of cheap wine. Alfred straightens, smiles all teeth.

“Pardon me, young sir, I don’t suppose you would mind letting me go?”

The man snorts. Alfred sighs, again- externally this time.

Ah well, if these blokes wanted things the hard way, then the hard way they would get.

Then he tips his chair back with a harsh roll, breaks it to smithereens under his weight, and comes back up standing, quickly tugging off his blindfold.

His arms are still tied. His limbs are slightly sluggish from the drugs. He’s all on his lonesome and has no evident back up on the way. There are at least fifteen young and spritely men ahead of him, intent on keeping him from his escape.

Uneven odds, then.

For  _ them. _

* * *

After calling the police, getting an escort home- the poor woman was rather shocked when he insisted they stopped for groceries- and dealing with the hullabaloo of his concerned charges, things settled back down.

For the most part. 

* * *

It’s Duke who cracks first, cornering him one day while he’s cleaning the bats with a stubborn, a worried look in his eye. The teen wrings his hands in front of him, consciously makes an effort to stop by shoving them into his hoodie, and frowns.

Alfred sighs.

“Yes, my dear boy?”

Duke startles, even though he was the one to approach with conversation in mind, and his shoulders hunch up to his chin guiltily. 

“Oh,” the boy starts, haltingly, “Sorry- it’s just- I wanted to check- are you really okay? Cause I got kidnapped last week and it was  _ terrifying. _ Like, not a fun experience  _ at all.  _ Zero out of ten stars.”

Alfred simply hums, making sure Francis’ coat is up to his immaculate standards, and then releases him back into the air. Then he whistles and calls the next creature down onto the table, where he picks up the brush and starts again.

Bruce has told him he doesn’t need to clean the bats. Bruce doesn’t understand the importance of keeping up appearances. 

“Master Duke, I appreciate the sentiment. But I assure you a measly kidnapping is of no need for concern. I used to be apart of the MI-F and the British Royal Guard. Those fiends were nothing in comparison.”

Duke blinks. Alfred ruffles soft fur and sends Carl on his merry way.

Linda is next. She’s a darling, truly, but a flighty little thing. He has to whistle for her twice to get her attention.

Duke is still blinking.

_ “Really?” _

“Quite so.”

A slow nod of understanding and dawning realization.

“Huh. I guess this makes more sense as to why no one was panicking.”

“I’m sure it helps that I have rescued myself from no less than thirty seven kidnappings. It comes with the trade, I suppose.”

Duke’s eyes are growing inexplicably wide. If not for his sense of propriety, Alfred might have laughed at the expression.

“You’re kidding me!”

The old butler shakes his head, keeps a straight face.

“I am most certainly not. Just check the board.”

_ “There’s a kidnapping board!?” _

Alfred nods assuredly, running a tender brush on leathery wings.

“Indeed.”

And the teen nods, nods, turns on his heel and walks away, murmuring quietly about his new family and how they are “insane, the whole lot of them, insane-”

Alfred waits until the young man is out of earshot, leans forward and whispers in Linda’s ear.

“Well, that was quite amusing, wouldn’t you say so Linda?”

Linda lets out a cry of- presumably- agreement. Alfred nods, smiling, and releases her, putting his fingers to his lips in order to call down Isabella-

* * *

Dick calls him that afternoon, voice deceptively casual over the line. 

Alfred humours him. They talk about work, about how the new adoptees are settling in. Alfred arranges for Dick to come home over the next weekend, Dick chats about some sort of ongoing office scandal, and the minutes slip by.

As they converse, the boy’s tone relaxes in a more authentic way, and by the time they hang up it’s completely carefree once more.

The old man silently chuckles, examining the old portrait in front of him and giving one last run through with his feather duster.

His eldest grandson is far more like Bruce than some might guess.

Then Alfred hums, riggs up his harness once more, and rappels down from the high manor ceiling to the ballroom far below.

* * *

Tim finds him next, approaches him some early hour of the morning with his arms laden with medical creams and a determined look on his face. There is bread dough rising on the counter for breakfast and only the quiet ticking of a clock to accompany them, and Alfred raises a sharp eyebrow.

Tim grins, sheepishly, spills his loot onto the kitchen table.

“Hey, Alfie. I’ve got neosporin and hydrogen peroxide. I figured that your wrists might be bothering you and these could help?”

He grimaces, and because he is a man who is willing to admit when he is defeated, sits down on one of the available chairs and rolls his sleeves up, revealing the ugly rope burns beneath.

“Ah,” he says, “how did you know?”

Tim doesn’t look up from where he’s pulling on latex gloves, simply focuses on opening the first capsule.

“Well,” the young teen murmurs in the quiet morning air, “Bruce has to get it from  _ somewhere. _ ”

Alfred pauses, considers-

_ Fair enough. _

He decides that the bread rolls should look just enough like Batman’s cowl that the family feels inclined to comment on it, but vaguely enough that it looks completely coincidental.

He has to get his amusement from somewhere, at all.

* * *

He’s pruning the shrubberies- Damian had had a tantrum earlier and taken to them with his katana- and Harper appears by his side.

“ _ Sooo~”  _ she drawls, leaning against a massacred bundle of branches, “you broke Duke.”

Alfred considers the bush before him, adds a decisive clip to the lower right.

“Truly?”

“Yup. Last I saw him he was in his room listening to Fall Out Boy. You  _ know _ it’s bad when he resorts to Fall Out Boy.”

Nodding concisevely, he adds another small trim to the top right of his masterpiece.

“Just so.”

For a few minutes, there’s silence.

And then-

“So,” she says, coughs. Shifts on her feet. “You’re okay, right? Nothing too awful or whatever?”

Alfred takes the time to nod, to smile small and reassuring. She smiles back, small and guarded, and it is enough.

More silence, but comfortable this time. Soft. Two beings coexisting in a softened moment all to their own.

And  _ then- _

“... is that a unicorn?”

“But of course.”

* * *

Tea is steeping in his favourite mug, soft music playing on his old radio in the background, and his estranged grandson is hiding in his petunias.

He sighs.

_ “Master Jason,  _ stop skulling in my flowers, if you please, and come and join me for a spot of tea.”

For a moment, silence.

Then there is a rustling in his flower garden, and a sheepish Jason Todd emerges.

“Should have known better than to try and pull a fast one on you, eh, Alfie?”

“Quite so. Now, come help me with this acrostic puzzle. Ten words across, most popular novel ever sold-”

“Oh, that’s  _ easy- Don Quixote  _ by Miguel Cervantes. What else do you have for me?”

* * *

When he next walks into his room, he finds a hand made card by Stephanie waiting on his bedside table. The young woman has decorated it in theme with the British flag, and has an excess amount of smiley faces across from it.

Alfred sighs, chuckling softly, and adds it to the rest.

It’s practically a tradition at this point, the get well cards of ridiculous designs. He’s been wondering when she would get around to delivering her latest.

And in turn, just as he always does, he takes out his case of coloured pencils and fine blank cardstock, and makes a letter in turn reassuring her of his well being.

After all, it is the thought that counts.

* * *

Cullen approaches him with a confidence he wouldn’t have had some months earlier, slides up beside him and takes over chopping carrots for tonight's fried rice.

Such a good lad.

They work in comfortable silence for a while, alternating chopping and whisking and general pre-dinner clean up. This is not the first time they’ve done this, these two souls without a mask to carry each night, and the company is familiar and warm.

But eventually, Cullen clears his throat, finishes drying up a stack of plates, and turns on him.

“I, uh- I just wanted to let you know that those guys who kidnapped got sentenced today- twenty years in prison. So- yeah. You don’t have to worry about them anymore.”

The old butler blinks, for he wasn’t particularly worried, but he supposes that justice being served is it’s own sort of validation, and so he nods and smiles softly.

“Thank you, my dear boy, for taking the time to tell me.”

Cullen nods, ducks his head to hide his responding grin, and Alfred looks fondly on.

* * *

He is up in the rafters of the old grand hall, hanging upside down to polish the wood, and Cass creeps up besides him.

Alfred nods to her in greeting.

“And how are you, my dear?”

The young woman shrugs, sits down cross legged. There is a frown pulling at her brow, which just won’t do.

So he pulls himself up to sit beside her, reaching out and taking her hand. He is not a very tactile man, but so much of what Cass reads is physical, and he is willing to make an exception.

“Now, Cass, don’t tell me you are blaming yourself for this whole mess. It’s just not proper.”

Her frown deepens, small calloused hands turning upwards to embrace his own, squeezing tightly.

“Ah no, no, none of that. You couldn’t have known.”

A breath, tightening fingers, and a small smile.

And then she’s leaping down to the ground below, leaving Alfred alone in the raftors to conquer the kingdom of spiderwebs lying in wait.

Satisfied, he tips back upside down, and gets back to work.

* * *

Damian glares at him, arms tightly crossed.

It’s three in the morning.

Alfred, from where he is reading on his bed, raises an eyebrow.

Damian glares harder.

The boy is sleep ruffled, hair all over the place and green eyes watery and haunted. He hasn't said a word since coming in, but he looks terribly young in the yellow glow of the lamp.

And then suddenly there is a soft sigh, and Damian’s tense muscles loosen seemingly in defeat. With dragging feet, the boy marches up besides him, leans in, and gives a fierce, quick hug.

Before Alfred can comment or even properly register, his youngest grandson is gone.

But the warm feeling that rises in his chest stays just the same.

* * *

Alfred is cleaning up stains off the infirmary floor- Master Tim had a small laceration on his chest- when Bruce comes in.

The man, so much older than he once was, reaches an arm up to put a hand on his shoulder, calloused palm and bruised fists steady.

“How are you, Alfred?”

And Alfred-

Sighs. It has been a long week, and as much as he wishes to reassure his grandchildren….

It can be difficult.

“I do believe I’m getting too old for this kidnapping nonsense.”

Bruce chuckles, deep brown eyes flashing in the dark, something kind and sympathetic shining though.

“Oh,” he says, voice warm, “Never that.”

And Alfred laughs in turn, giving his son in all but blood a soft smile. 

There had been a time in his life in which Alfred thought he would die alone.

Secret agents, after all, don’t get to have families. They don’t get to be close with loved ones, to enter another life’s with their secrets bared and their pasts open. They don’t get loved ones.

The world is an aching breaking thing, ugly and human and scrambling for purchase in an existence that does not stop. Alfred had a sword duty and an obligation to uphold, a sense of stubborn youth that told him he’d make a life worth living for the few years he got of it. That he had his training and he had a cause and that that was  _ enough. _

But here he is now, old and loved and cared for, surrounded by a family who will never shy away from danger. Surrounded by people who will not flee, who will fight beside him, _ for  _ him, on any given day.

The world is an aching breaking thing, but he has lived long enough to know that it is also the masterpieces you make of it, that the humanity of it all carves ugly but it also streams forth in the most dazzling forms of beautiful life. He is so much more than a cause, than a mission carved into his bones. 

There had been a time in his life in which Alfred thought he would die alone.

And yet,  _ here he is. _


	31. take this sinking boat and point it home (we've still got time)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1/31/2020
> 
> *Chapter Title From Falling Slowly, Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova.*
> 
> Last chapter everyone. Mentions of medical situations, Bruce's parents, sad childhoods. 
> 
> Hope you all enjoy. <3

Bruce is twenty one years old. There are scars on his chest and aching in his soul. There is a life stretching out before his feet and he cannot see it, laden down by a cause he wrought being carved into his bones.

He started a fire and it is burning him alive, and yet he will not leave the flickering flames in fear of it going out in all this darkness.

 _You see, you see_ \- Bruce broke one deep black night. His world shattered at his feet with the singing crystalline _plinks_ of bloodied pearls. There was a gunshot and a ringing in his ears. There was death, so much _death,_ and the darkness swallowed him whole.

There was always going to be cruelty in this world.

This trembling fine tuned moment that aches and stings and falls apart. There is a silence lingering in the aftermath, and it is louder than any sound.

A butler old and tired, but not as much as he one day will be, a child scrambling for any shattering semblance of control, and an aching silent period that ends with an aching silent absence and an empty bed.

_(The silences have shapes, look, look, can’t you see the stories they are trying to tell?)_

He fell apart and he built himself back up, but glue cannot heal the glass fractures completely. Putting pieces back together, it is still far more fragile than it ever was before.

Bruce runs away in the dead of night and he does not come back unchanged. He learns to fight and learns to feel pain and learns to breathe again. He feels like he is composed of those fractures. He feels like he is composed of all his broken parts. And they shift- inside his lungs, inside his chest, these deep and shattered things that ache.

And he breathes around them. He is caught in a fire he built himself, one that will burn all around him all his life, and the sparks light up a dark he cannot escape.

And still- And still-

Inhale. Exhale. And breathing still.

This is not nothing.

_There is a story that hasn’t been told about a boy who set a fire that burned him alive._

_You see, you see, he set those flames because the stars were going out, one by one by one, and he could not bear to see them go._

_We are the causes we carve into our bones._

_Well, this was his._

_He set the flames and he breathed life into those sparks, and they rose up and up and got caught in the inky blackness, where they shone just as brightly- singing and aching living anew._

Bruce is twenty two years old. There is a lifetime ahead of him he cannot see. There is a lifetime behind shrouded in darkness.

So very much of his life always has been.

(He breathes life into the flames he stands upon and watches them rise higher.)

He is alone. He is no young and shaking youth.

And yet-

And yet there is a man before him old and grey, with kind eyes and steady hands that do not shake.

(The man will be older and greyer, still, before this is done.)

And Bruce is standing there on the front step of an old house that used to be home. He stands there and there is a cause in his bones eating him alive, a mantra that hisses _never again, never again,_ with something like vengeance, something like grief.

And Bruce stands there on the front step he left not so long ago, a lifetime ago- somewhere in between. Wayne Manor looms the way ghosts do, haunting and distant and all too close. Life looms greater still, unknown and undefined and full of contradictions, and here and here and here.

Funny, how that works. How life never explains and people keep living anyway.

Funny.

Alfred looks at him, and there are a thousand words that Bruce can say, this young man who stopped being young the moment he heard those singing bloodied pearls. This young man who does not shake, but only because there are shards in his chest and the jostling makes them ache, makes them shift and break anew.

There are a thousand words, and none of them come rolling from his tongue. 

_(A story told in silences, ringing on and on and on.)_

This is a house, not a home. 

(Not yet.)

And yet-

There is something curling in his chest, pressing gently against all those broken things. It whispers of soft and caring truths and this man who tried to make himself hollow, tried to make himself stone-

He does not know how to deal with it.

He thinks he’s not supposed to care, not after so long, not after all the steps he’s taken to get away. This old butler who waited for him, all these long years of his life. This old butler that took his shattered semblances of control and smoothed out rough edges as best as he was able. The old butler he left behind.

There are a million moments between them they never got to share.

There are a million moments. 

Alfred looks at him, with old eyes that will one day be older still, and it somehow feels like coming home despite all his shattered parts, despite all this darkness, despite his hollow chest of fragile aching truths he cannot escape, will never escape.

Bruce clears his throat.

“I’m here,” he says, because he is. Because other words won’t leave his curled tongue.

(Not yet.)

And Alfred looks at him with eyes that see right through him, and Bruce breathes and breathes and breathes.

This is love, in the end, this aching silent thing. It burns your heart with a fire it cajoles you to make and keeps away the dark. It pierces you right through and it does not let go, not if you don’t let it.

It’s breathing. It’s in your breath. 

Inhale. Exhale. That’s _love,_ filling up your chest, carving shapes that no words can express.

There is a future in front of him and he cannot see it. 

Alfred opens the door wide and lets him in.

_People are composed of the truths they tell themselves in the deep dark of night. They are the choices they make, the lines they draw in the sand. Hollow and hallow and fallow and following every pathway marked out by the stars._

_One step, another, all the long days of our lives._

_How strange. How beautiful._

_How human._

_On and on and on._

Bruce is twenty three years old, and he’s more terrified than he’s been in a long, long time.

“Shh, kiddo, shhh-”

Dick’s breathing, but just barely. Shallow gasping inhales and exhales, not enough, _not enough-_

Hydrogen sulfide exposure. Killer Croc. Nasty Gotham sewers and a drive back to the Batcave that’s taking too long even at ninety miles an hour.

His ward whines, high pitched, desperate, and then retches onto the Batmobile floor. Batman grimaces, leans forward in his seat, and drives faster.

He should have been prepared for this. He should have thought to keep amyl nitrate in his belt. Should have realized the dangers. Should have made his partner hold back and let him go first. _Something._

But he should have been _better than this._

But bygones won’t help Robin. _Fear_ won’t help Robin. Won’t help him breathe. Won’t help stop this terrible panicky silence that is filling up his ears in replacement of the usual easygoing chatter.

It won’t _help._

And yet he is terrified. And yet he laments.

Emotions are never as logical as he thinks they should be. 

They screech into the Batcave, and Bruce is jarring open the passenger door in moments, hauling Dick out and cradling him to his chest, sprinting to the medical ward where Alfred is waiting with the oxygen tank, with bronchial medicine, with something actually _helpful._

“I’m fine,” his ward wheezes, obviously not fine, “I’m fine.”

“Shh, Dickie, shh. _Breathe._ ”

And Dick does. One inhale. Another. His eyes are wide and glassy, latching onto Bruce’s even as small fingers grip onto his own calloused palms, nails digging in scarred skin.

Bruce doesn’t mind the pain. He just keeps track as Dick breathes and breathes and breathes.

There is something building in his chest. Something pushing panic up into his throat. It’s been building for a while.

It was supposed to be temporary, this. Dick didn’t deserve the orphanage but he didn’t deserve Bruce, either, not him with all his broken parts and aching silences and a house that is not a home. It was supposed to be _temporary._

And yet he’s here, with this kid who laughs so brightly, who fills up this empty manor like it could be something more than a ghost. Who holds the darkness back and is not burned by the flames. Dick smiles at him like he hung the stars in the sky, like he is worth more than the darkness that shrouds him. Dick picks up the mantle for a cause that is not his own and makes it something more than just vengeance. Makes it something good and true in this life that is all to often unkind.

And yet Bruce is here, he’s _here,_ and it feels like he’s cradling a miniature sun in the palms of his hands. There is something warm in his chest that has been building and building and building, and it feels like hope, feels like _love-_

Oh.

_Oh._

Because this is love too, isn’t it? This brilliant thing you hold close to your chest when even when your blue skies turn grey. Love is so often good, so often gentle. It does not wait for you to ask it gives, freely and eternal and forever. It spills out of your pockets and into your lungs. It dances, and flies when everything seems heavy, brings you back to life. It is something to hold onto when you are at your lowest points. It buoys you up. 

When everything flees from Pandora’s box, there is hope, and there is the love that makes it.

Bruce is no young and shaking youth. But he aches, he aches, he aches-

He was meant to be hollow. He was meant to be stone.

Dick closes his eyes and holds his hands close, breathing in precious oxygen and letting the world pass him by, far too trusting, far too kind. Bruce allows himself one moment to think about what he would do if this life in his care were to diminish into nothing.

And he _can’t._

There is a fire inside his chest. There is something coming alive in the flames.

Bruce leans down, presses his forehead against Dick’s soft brow, and breathes and breathes and breathes.

Funny, isn’t it? That the most broken hearts in the world can learn to love anew. How the people take other people with all their aching shattered parts and love every fractures piece. How people _love,_ even in this world that is cruel and unkind and unjust.

Funny.

_Let me tell you a truth that cannot be explained, something that grows in the silence in your chest and echoes. Let me tell you a truth about the stars, about how they call you on those deep dark nights where your fires burn low and your chest aches. Where breathing is a chore and life is not fair-_

_And yet you are breathing still._

_This is not nothing. This will never be nothing. Look at you, look at you, a thousand contradictions wrapped up in skin and flesh and bone, following charted pathways among every night sky because there are steps to be taken and you are willing to take them, on and on and on._

_Let me tell you a truth that cannot be explained, that life is a mystery and yet we are still living. Still loving. Still here._

Bruce is thirty years old, sitting on a sofa, trying not to move.

There are shattered aching things in his chest, and a fire that burns more than light. He is angry, this man, and broken, and so much more.

There is a boy slumped on his shoulder, the dead weight of sleeping children everywhere. On the T.V. before them, _The Princess Bride_ goes through its ending credits. He can’t say he’s been paying attention, not since Jason nodded off on his shoulder. Not since he realized that he was willing to sit there, perfectly still, for as long as the boy needed to wake back up again.

Not since he realized that he loves him, this feisty child with a heart too big for his chest and a lifetime yet unled. 

He didn’t mean to, he thinks. He wanted to help, yes. He wanted to care.

He’s not so sure he wanted to love.

But love never asks. It does not garner permission before it swoops into your chest and carries you away. It does not make things easy nor clean cut. It happens. It happens and happens and happens, and the fact that it happens to you makes the world spin round.

Jason murmurs, curls closer. And Bruce breathes.

This is not nothing.

So many shattered aching things inside his chest. So many scars on his calloused skin. There is a future lying at his feet and he cannot see it. There is a fire burning higher and he is breathing in the flames.

There is a boy asleep at his side, trusting and caring and hear, and Bruce loves him.

This boy, this angry brilliant boy who fights every dying light because for so long it has meant his very survival. This boy who curses and swears and speaks like poetry. This boy who hurts, who bleeds, who helps. Who cares so fiercely it is a wonder he is even alive.

Contradiction wrapped up in skin and flesh and bone, and Bruce _loves him._

Funny, that.

_Life is not kind. It is not fair._

_But life isn’t cruel, either. Not on purpose. Life just_ is _and everyone and anyone goes along with it, lacking in explanation and surviving anyway._

_Life just is, and people are so much more._

_People, who can be greedy, who can be cruel. Who can break things best not broken and draw lines in the sand best swept away. Diverse, incredible people who are responsible for every wonderful act of humanity and every last downfall._

_People, who are people, who are people. Brilliant and disastrous and here._

_A planet full of eight billion people- and every last one of them is born to love._

_Funny, that._

Bruce is thirty three years old, and he has been shattered anew and left still breathing.

He thought that there must be a limit to how many times one person could break. He thought that this grief inside his hollow bones could not be added to, not when it has already taken up so much of his stone chest.

He thought.

But here is a truth that no one explains: grief is but love with nowhere else to go.

And love is infinite. It is forever. It stretches on and on and on.

And Bruce is no young and shaking youth, but he feels shaken, deep inside his core, his fractured pieces jarred and aching.

He is standing at a science fair, watching Tim receive his well-earned first place ribbon, and being swallowed alive by his sheer existence.

Because he had thought, he had thought that there must be a limit to how many times he could fall into this trap, how many times this warm balloon in his chest could break before it could never buoy back up again. Surely he has loved and lost and grieved one time too many, for this?

And yet-

And yet there Tim is, standing up by the podium, smile shy and sheepish and proud, and how can Bruce turn his back on this? This boy, this stubborn brilliant boy who found him and held on tight, who picked up a cause not his own and carved it deep into his bones. Who was willing to brave the fire.

Tim, who grins softly when he thinks no one is looking.Tim, who has to work harder than anyone and always pushes through. Tim, who had mentioned his science fair off-hand with no inclined belief anyone would show up to support him-

Tim, who Bruce loves, despite his every shifting shattered fragment and broken truth.

He is in the audience, applauding, and Tim catches sight of him, eyes widening. And Bruce is afraid, he is so very afraid, because there is so much darkness and it is always closing in, because he is standing in a fire that he himself built and it is burning him alive.

But there is no limit, you see. Love has no limit. It just _is,_ and it does not explain and it does not stop and Bruce may not be young but he is human, he has always been so tragically wondrously human, and there is _strength_ in that.

He breathes, he breathes. He loves.

This is not nothing.

_There is a reason for little white lies._

_The truth hurts, you see. It festers under the skin and pours out into the open, harsh and screaming and unyielding. Brilliant, aching truth: it has brought down great souls under its weight. It will bring down greater still._

_To live a life of truth is to sting, to tear in a thousand little spaces. It is rewarding, but it can hurt. It can break._

_But to live a life of lies is to hide from everything and anything, to curl up somewhere dark and deep and never see the stars._

_It is to not live at all._

Bruce is thirty five years old and he is too late. 

There is a girl lying bloodied and thankless besides him, and he is far, far too late.

There are cracks in her mask and noise and light all around him, and Bruce can’t breathe for the aching in his chest, the way it shatters without any singing bloodied pearls in sight. 

Stephanie’s eyes are very blue, contrasting with all the red. It’s swirling, staining, spreading, and Bruce keeps pressure and his Robin bleeds and bleeds and bleeds.

It’s not fair. It is never, ever fair. A young woman breathing gasping breaths that may be her last. A young woman he pushed aside until far far too late.

Because this is love, too, this heartbreaking thing. The way it tears you down to nothing. The way it breaks you in all your most fragile graces. The way it hides from you until it turns to grief, and then is all too present.

Bruce breathes, because he has to. Bruce does not shake, because he cannot fall apart, not now, _not now._

Bruce loves, because it’s all he can do.

 _“Was I good Robin?”_ she asks, and it hurts, it _hurts._

“Of course you were, _of course you were._ ”

What else can he say? What _else?_ He had so many chances for words and he did not take them, instead letting his silences fill the world with ugly broken shapes. There were stories he could have told and he did not tell them, he let them slip away-

The truth aches. It aches, and he was too blind to see-

_“Of course you were,”_ he tells her, and it falls on deaf ears.

_People are hollow and hallow and fallow and following every pathway marked out by the stars._

_But tell me this, tell me this- what is a constellation but the pathways we mark out for ourselves? The universe is endless but so are we, inside of our own chests, stretching on and on and on into infinity with all these broken beautiful truths we cannot contain._

_We are not finite. We are here._

_There is a difference._

Bruce is thirty eight years old and is standing stock still while light feet balance easily on his shoulders, their owner dancing back and forth across the length of his arms, spatters of paint dripping onto his hair.

He is smiling at the wall, a small soft truth of happiness creeping onto his skin, and he is caught in his own existence.

Cass is silent, as she paints, slapping colours across her bedroom with a graceless enthusiasm usually found in those much younger, in those where life has not landed quite so heavy, quite so hard.

But Cass is many things, and one to follow a predestined path is not one of them. She is spirited, this girl, alive and breathing and here and here and here. She _explodes_ with passion, this childish naive thing that leaves everything else behind, that picks you up and carries you away.

Passion is love, after all. It is endless.

Silences make shapes and love is the universal, expanding and forever and _here_. It fills you up. It brings you to life.

Bruce lets it.

He is still a man with too many shattered parts in his chest, but he is learning that there is room, too, for soft and wholesome things. He is learning that existing does not have to ache. He is learning that a world shattering at his feet does not mean life will never go on.

He faces the tentative fragile thing unfolding in his chest and allows it to grow. 

He is here. He is _here._ And breathing still.

_People do things that hurt others, they make mistakes and commit crimes, they burn and they bruise and they heal and they laugh and joke and cry and rage. We are all, in the end, but shades of endless grey, and do not believe anyone who tells you otherwise._

_It is difficult, as all important things are, to understand. It is maybe difficult for a reason._

_We are all shades. Life is a mix of shades and colours._

_It is broken. It is beautiful._

_It is a gift._

_It is y o u r s._

Bruce is forty one years old, and he is trying to cross a wall he himself built up.

There is a fire in his chest, you see. He lit it and stood in the flames because he has a cause he carved into his bones and ringing bloodied pearls echoing in his ears.

He is used to things being of his own making. 

He is not used to breaking them back down.

But Bruce has learned the dangers of acting too late. He has learned the pain that haunts when you admit love only after it turns to grief.

Damian has a chain of animals in need to be washed, music playing on the cave speakers, and a stubborn, uncertain scowl settled upon his face.

Bruce, patient, does not draw attention to this.

Instead, he fills his assigned tub up with warm water and follows instructions as his youngest directs him back and forth, back and forth, herding his zoo of pets into their assigned wash bins and offering a deluge of soft pats and ear scratches, comforting words and small secret smiles when he thinks Bruce is not looking.

Together, they go through the long line of animals, and Bruce watches as Damian happily throws himself into the work, relaxing as the minutes tick by.

It is not a surprise, really, to think, _Oh, I love him._

Bruce has had practice. A lot of practice. And sometimes love, even in the most complicated of relationships, can be the simplest of things.

And he has ached over this, yes. Has seethed and raged and fallen apart. There are a million moments between them he cannot get back and it is terrible _terrible-_

And yet-

All that grey and here they are. All that grey and he still has this, _this,_ Damian humming softly along with the music, putting young calloused fingers to good use, offering him a face of nothing but warmth.

Bruce smiles, because he can. Because he wants to.

And this is not nothing.

_Life does not explain. It happens. Life does not ache, people do._

_Listen, listen, the silences have shapes and the stories are always being told, carved into constellations and carved into bone. We are masterpieces unto ourselves and anyone who tells you otherwise has walked all their life with their eyes shut tight._

Bruce is forty three years old, and there is a teen by his side in colours that do not belong to him, in colours that he has made his own.

Duke, who survived in the face of madness, who lived in the face of isolation. Who bd himself higher on mountain’s worth of uneven odds and persevered through sheer power of will. Duke, who is young, who has lived and loved and grieved in his own way. Who is still so willing to be a light in the dark for those who go without.

“Let me _help,”_ he says, and Bruce knows this feeling in his chest, this sense of care. This sense of warmth.

Love is this. Love is _this._

Batman grunts, turns, and expects to be followed.

Duke, grinning and brilliant and rash, does just that.

_Aching and broken things. Self contained universes deep within our chests. Infinity confined into singular motion._

_Surviving, living, and human._

_That is love, that is love, that is love._

Bruce is forty four, and he is breathing still. There is a fire in the eyes of this young woman before him, and he recognizes it from the flames inside his own soul.

Sometimes you must light your world on fire in order to creep forwards through the darkness. Sometimes you must survive before you can live.

Funny, isn’t it? That you can be as old and as tired as Bruce and still find someone you connect with, just like that. Someone you care about because both your spirits have been smoldered in the same weldings of life. Because you recognize the scars scattered across each other’s skin.

And Batman has been made of stone, once, twice, and he has been hollow a thousand times. But he is human, still. He is terribly achingly human and this a planet of people born to love, and so when he sees her-

Well. What else can he do?

He invites her to a home he made all his own, built on the foundations of the people inside it. 

And Cullen, Cullen, who is so tired and so scared, who is made up of his own shattered chest. Bruce recognizes that too, the way that it aches. The way that it feels like it can tear you apart.

Cullen is a young and shaking youth in all the places Bruce could never be, and there is strength in that. In living and acknowledging the broken pieces. In living.

There is cruelty in this world and it weighs down heavier on some than most. Cullen has been flattened by it, carved by it, shattered again and again and again into fragments of his fractured truths.

And yet-

And yet he is still here. He is still here and ready to be loved, willing _to_ love in a life that can be filled with so much unkindness.

And this is not nothing. 

_Tell me a truth that no one has heard. Write it in the stars and follow it home._

Bruce is forty six years old. There are scars on his chest and aching in his soul. There is a life stretching out before his feet and he cannot see it, laden down by a cause he wrought being carved into his bones.

But he will not walk forwards alone. He will not carry the weight of his self-made burden with no one by his side.

He started a fire and its flames rise higher and higher, and _they keep the darkness back_.

To be burned does not mean you will not live. To be burned does not mean you will not love.

 _You see, you see_ \- Bruce broke one deep black night. His world shattered at his feet with the singing crystalline _plinks_ of bloodied pearls. There was a gunshot and a ringing in his ears. There was death, so much _death,_ and the darkness swallowed him whole.

There was always going to be cruelty in this world.

But there is also always going to be so much life. People are people are people and we are the truths we carve into our bones, our lines in the sand, the aches in our chests. We are the pathways we trace through the stars, self determined constellations and so much more.

We are love, so much love, expanding and endless and forever. We are the stories we tell in the dead of night and the silences we leave echoing on and on and on.

We are moments. A million moments tucked close and gentle to our hearts, gold in a sea of grey.

Contradictions wrapped up in skin and flesh and bone. We are _alive._ Inexplicably, miraculously alive. _We are here._

We are human.

Bruce stands on a precipice at the corner of the universe, and he breathes through all the shattered things in his chest.

He is not alone. Surrounding him is a family that has ached and beaten and bruised, that loves so fiercely it is a wonder they do not die from it. 

There is a cause running through their veins. It will not swallow them whole, not when they carry the weight together. 

There is laughter. There is life. There is so much love.

And this is not nothing.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And that's a wrap!
> 
> Here we are, one month later, and over one hundred and fifty pages of google docs! I never could have done it without the consistent support of everyone involved in this wonderful community. So thank you so much to everyone who took the time to read, to comment, to kudos, and to leave prompts! You guys are just so wonderful and I really had a fantastic experience interacting with you. :3
> 
> (Special shout out to batmango, EzrazCake, marionette3, and average_lasagna. You guys all just left such wonderful comments on practically everything I wrote, and they brightened my every day. Thank you so so much for your love and care! <3 <3 <3)
> 
> If you didn't have your every prompt responded to, please don't fear! I will probably be back with another one of these challenges eventually, and will type up some responses then. If you want to read some of my other stuff, I have a lot of other fics here on AO3. 
> 
> If you're like, "wow there's a lot of spelling errors and choppy stories" I am aware. I will be going through and editing and adding. I'll let commentors know if I add a bunch of stuff to a chapter they liked and reviewed.
> 
> If you're like "Man alive! I really wish this was apart of a full work and not just a one shot!" ...you may not be lucky but you MIGHT BE WHO KNOWS. Right now I'm writing an extended version of one of my March Madness chapters, and I'm over 25 pages in. As of this fic, I definitely know the Dragon one is a part of a larger universe.... *shrugs*
> 
> ANYWAYS. YUP. YEAH. 
> 
> Thanks again, everyone. I hope you enjoyed reading January Jot-Downs. See you all around soon! <3


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